The history and description of fossil fuel, the collieries, and coal trade of Great Britain

John Holland · 1900 · Historical

The history and description of fossil fuel, the collieries, and coal trade of Great Britain by John Holland (1900). Full text and reference in the Mountain…

Public-domain full text preserved in the Mountain Man Mining Library. Original source: archive.org.

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Fossil Fuel,

The Collieries,

And

Coal Trade.

Sheffield :

FRIMTEP BT Q. RIDGB, MERCrRV OPPICK, KINn-STRECT.

The

Bistory And Description

Fossil Fuel, The Collieries,

Coal Trade Of Great Britain.

BY THE lUTHOH OF THE

Treatise On Manufactures In Metal,"

(TBkMl TOLDKia,)

In Lardneb'S Cabinet Cyclopedia.

oicB n Hia rLuaiD ihi ALUiairTT to fioti: — iWtfiin to FmKaMtia, from StafforOAin CoBit

London :

Whittaekk And Co., Ate Maria Lake;

AND O. MDOl, ElHO-tTBI

183d.

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The hawrenco Scientific choo

9 Febrnr;,ry, 1888.

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Preface.

In presenting this Work to the public, the Author has to bespeak the indulgence of certain classes of individuals, whose anticipated gratification he can only hope to have partially succeeded in realizing : he alludes to those who may happen to be profes- sionally engaged in any of the branches of science or business touched upon in the following pages. Should it, therefore, be discovered that the writer of this treatise is neither a Geologist, a Collier, nor a Coal Merchant, the harshness of criticism may surely be deprecated, until some one avowedly possessing such threefold qualification shall compile a volume better adapted than the present for po- pular instruction, and more accurately conformable to the present state of knowledge in reference to the various matters discussed.

That the subject is an interesting one, few per- sons, it may be presumed, will deny : indeed, this fact is abundantiy illustrated by the importance attached to disquisitions on one branch of it, by

Vi Preface.

geological writers — to another of its bearings by the legislature — and to the third, by the whole community : for the origin and position of our stores of fossil fuel have abundantly exercised the learning of the first class ; the regulation of its vend at home and abroad, the attention of the second ; and the economical application of it, is confessedly of transcendent importance to the third class — comprising, as it also does, both the others.

On these grounds, the writer — whose literary avocations have brought him into contact with cognate inquiries, and who, on other accounts, may perhaps be allowed to presume he is not quite unqualified for the task — thought that a compre- hensive but somewhat compendious notice of the whole subject, as announced in the title-page, and arranged as a sort of monograph, while it would be convenient and useful for the library in general, could hardly fail to be acceptable to many persons who, without wishing to push their inquiries into those voluminous publications through which the matter lies scattered, much less who think of em- barking capital in the coal trade on the credit of any literary recommendation, might nevertheless be glad to meet with a succinct description of what has been done in the various departments, and the bearing of which is actually so important.

Preface. Yu

Changing the person, and adopting the sentiment of Mr. Williams, who, in 1 789, published at Edin- burgh a Natural History of the Mineral Kingdom, written in a quaint and prolix style, — '' I am really concerned for the honour of the coal : it is an in- teresting subject, especially in Britain ;"' — cannot, however, entirely adopt the next member of the sentence, correct as it may have been half a cen- tury ago — ''and, as very little to the purpose has been said about it hitherto, that I know of, I reckon the subject my own, and therefore,'' adds our author, '' I wish to be its faithful historian." Entertaining, as I have done, this laudable wish, and having laboured — surely not without some success — to realize it in these pages, I cannot justly complain either of a paucity of materials, or of those not being to the purpose : my only appre- hension is, lest I may have been unfortunate enough in some instances to have overlooked, or unsatis- factorily to have exhibited, such as were the most excellent.

Contents.

Chapter I.

INTRODUCTOBy — TIRS AND FUEL.

Page FixeIta obvknu pioperties— Corpnscnlar and undulating theories — Soofoes of Fire— The Sun— Lightning — Chemical action — Notices of the production of Fire by friction— Uses of Fire- In connexion with Religion— For Culinary purposes — For pro- moting personal comfort— In the operations of Metallurgy and the Alts— Agents or supporters of Combustion — Bituminous and animal substances, or products— Dung and Sea-weed — Peat, Wood and Mineral Fuels 1

Chapter U.

Osolooical Thxoriss.

ImeiertiBg chaacter of Gedogksal Sdenee— Extent of knowledge letoired for sueceafiil inrestigatiim— Contioferaies and cun- fiicting theoneft— lupofftant connexion between Geology and Revflation Qugstion of progressive developeaient of Species — Button and Wener— Subtenanean teanperature— Pisioxysmal and Catttdysmal Eras of MM. Beaumont, Bnmgniart, and Cvviep— Jameson's Remarks — Mineral and Mosaical Oecogies contiaaied — Fairholme— Theory of Werner— Tabular view of the positions of Strata— Fonnatioas — Gradation of FossQs of vegetable origin 17

Chapter Iii.

P£At.

Eariy use of Peat for ¥%£A — Its abundance in various countries— Hypothesis of the discovery of its inflammable nature — Notioes of the knowledge and application of Peat in ancient time— Theories of die eiigin of Tarf depositB— Various opimons and testancmialfl coneenteg the bituminiaation of Vegetable Matter — Fknfs whleh iefly enter into the composition of Peat bog— Uh and Sesteh bog mossea— Bxtrsneons rcMiins fbvind in PesI bog— Aariegy between the depositions of some stiutiiied turbaiiea and the Coal foimalion— Method of digging and

b

X Contents.

P*ge

preparing Peat in Ireland — Varieties of Peat — Old practice of cliarrifig Turf — Popular prejudices in favour of Peat Fuel 40

Chapter Iv.

Natural History Of Coal.

Nature and origin of Coal — Different opinions which have been entertained on that subject — Hypotlietical queries answered — Inferences and illustrations of the vegetable origin of Coal — Chemical investigations of Mr. Hatchett — Three conditions of FoBsil Fuel ; submerged forests, lignites or bituminized wood, and true Coal — Description of the Bovej Coal formation — Sup- posed state of the atmosphere at the period when tlie Coal Vegetables flourished — Remarks on the prodigious supply of materials — Forests and drift wood — Have the vegetable matters forming the Coal strata been floated from a distance, or did they originally grow in situations near to those places where, in their changed condition, they are now found ? — Causes which may have operated in effecting the bitnminization of the Coal plants — Opinions of Mr. Penn and others — Supposed peaty origin of Coal — Anthracite 57

Chapter V.

Organic Remains.

Opinions of the Ancients concerning Organic Remains — Equi- vocal generation — Operation of plastic and forming energies — Conditions of vegetable remains — Families of plants existing at the period when the Coal beds were deposited — Plants of the upper Coal — Cycadiform fronds — Ligneous fossils of the true Coal formation — Mr. Witham's observations — Modifying causes of the variety of casts of stems discovered in different substances — Figures and descriptions — Microscopical examination of the minute structure of fossil bodies — Probability that trees of the more complicated woody structure, as well as the merely vascular and cellular kinds, existed at the period of the Coal formation — Fossil fishes — Muscles — Question of toads found alire in the Coal rocks — Hutton's observations on the traces of existing vegetable tissues in the perfect kinds of Coal 85

Chapter Vi.

The Coal Formation.

Review of the arrangement of carboniferous strata, as forming Coal fields, Coal basins, and Coal measures — Arrowsmith's Map of the Coal districts — Somersetshire Coal field — South Gloucestershire or Bristol Coal fieldForest of Dean — South Welsh Coal fieldShropshire field— South Staffordshire and Warwickshire— North Staffordshire — North Wales— Lancashire

CONTENTS. Xi

Coal field— Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, and Derbyshire Coal fields— Whitehaven Coal field— Northumberland and Durham —Unexplored localities in Enghwd— Scotch Coal fields- Ayrshire — Paisley — Lanarkshire — East Lothian — Cnlreca Irish Coal fields— Districts of Leinster, Munster, Connaught, and Ulster — Description of a Coal basin — Somecsetshire and South Welsh basins — Mantle, and inverted basin shapes— Swilleys or small basins no

Chapter Vil

COAL MBASURfiS.

Meaning of the terms Coal Measures"— Arrangc&ent, contor- tions, and dislocations of strata — Vertical section of a deep pit

near Newcastle — Tabular view of substances passed through

Gosforth colliery — Depth of the High Main Seam at Jarrow

Sections of Mines at Dudley and fiilston — Inequality in the thickness of matter occurring between certain Coal seams- Tabular view of strata at Whitehaven — Synopsis of Coal measures at Ashby-de-la-Zouch — Stafibrdshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire, and Yorkshire Coal fields — Sheffield — Section at Halifax— Notices of the Coal strata in South Wales, Scotland, and Ireland — Occurrence of iron ores in the Coal formation... 139

Chapter Viii.

Dislocations Of Strata.

Common occurrence of fissured strata — Longmire's theory of veins, dykes, rents, slips, &c. — How characterised — Up-throw and down-throw dykes — Section of fractured Coal measures at Jar- row — Enormous disturbances produced by faults — Great trap dyke of Yorkshire and DurhamThe ninety-fathom dyke of Northumberland — The seventy-yards Whin dyke — The " great Derbyshire denudation" of Farey— Non-conformity of overlying and subjacent masses — Supposed igneous origin of trap or basaltic dykes — Advantages of those dislocations misnamed faults"— Professor Buckland's observations 157

Chapter Ix.

Boring And Sinking.

Relative Views of the Miner and the Geologist in searching for Coal — Extent and localities of carboniferous strata mostly ascertained — Superficial indications of Coal — Examination by boring — Description of boring apparatus — Interesting nature of the search after mineral treasures — Sizes of pits — Windlass used in commencement of sinking — Walling inside the shaft — Tubbing — Blasting with gunpowder— Description of the horse

Xii CONTENTS.

Pfcge

gin— Expensiveness of sinking deep pits-Pemberton's shaft at Monkweannonth—Adits ot drifts 172

Chapter X.

Working Machinxet.

Drawing and air shafts— Importance of Ventilation— Draining the Mine— Bearing of strata— Early contrivances for raising the water— Backet wheels— Steam-engine— Boalton and Watt — Pumping apparatna— Subterranean Steam-engines — Deep Pits divided by BratticingHead Gear— Whimsey— Steam-engine and counterpoise — Hydraulic Machinery for raising Coals — Corres, Trams, Buckets, and Waggons— Screen— Entrance to Pits by Canals and Footfalls 191

Chapter Xi.

uNDBBoaoDiin woaxs and txntilation.

Methods of Carrying out the Underground Excavations of a Col- liery—Broad and Long Work— Roads, Benks, and Gates — Plan of a Staffordshire Colliery— Ventilation— Theory of the Circulation ot Atmospheric Air— Downcast and Upcast Shafts — Furnace— Simple and Compound Ventilation— Other contri- vances— Description of Felling Colliery, Durham — Extensive and orderly arrangements— Fire Damp and Choke Damp — Scheme of Ventilation proposed by Mr. Menzie— Blowen or jets of Inflammable Gaa— How got rid of 211

CHAPTER XII. osttino the coal.

Ideas of unpleasantness and danger associated with Coal Pits in general — Few persons like to descend to inspect the subterra- nean workings — An interesting sight to the Visitor — Impressions experienced in traversing the deep fiery mines about New- castle— Plan of removing the pillars which support the roof- Crushes or creeps — Working crept Coal — Appearance of the Pitmen underyrround — Steel mill — Use of Horses — Anecdote — Employment of Females — Implements used by the Collier — Fractures of the Coal — Backs, cutters, and partings — Method of breaking down the Live Coal — Attempts at the introduction of Machinery.. 292

CHAPTER Xin.

Unobrgbound Accidents.

Various dangers to which the Collier is exposed — Falling of matters irom the roof of the Mine — Cauldron bottoms, bell moulds, and bleas— Irruptions of Water — Instances of Flooding

C0NTSIIT8. Ziii

—Occurrence of SubterraneaB Fivtt fnmi aatunl, aoadenul, and wilful caoses — Bzpkmons from f nflmmtUe Gas— Dvnd- lul AoddoBt at FdliBg Colliery— Dolaik of the Cataatvoph— Fire Damp and Choke Damp 347

Chapter Xiv.

THS SArZTT LAMP.

Ciicumataaoes whidi led Id the formation of a Society Ibf Pre- senting Aocidenta in Collieri— ApplicatioB to Sir Hnrnjrej Davy — Chemical Compoalion ef the inflannahle €htf of the Minee— Will not explode in onall Tubea, nor from contact with red-hot Iron or Charoaal— Pint Safo Lantern— Wiie-Oanse CafpD— Dcseription of the Common Safety Lamp — Teatimonialfl of respect to Sir H. Davy — Opinions of Mr. Buddie and Mr. fenwick in fitronr of the Dary"— Petition of the Stafford- ahixe Collieis--Circamsta]ioe8 under which £zploBionB hafe talnn plnoe in connezion with the Davy Lamp... 968

Chapter Xv.

Tbs Colubib.

Pitmen poasen distinct Cliamcteri8tic-*-Working in the Mines an andent penal employment— Intelligence of Colliers, and Indi- fidnala who have risen into notice from among them — Morals, Recreations and Tastes— Wages— Dwellings and HahiU of the Pitmen ahout Newcastle — Denominalions of OTorseers and Workmen— Undertakers of Coal Pits in Staffordshire— The Col. y Hers— Instance of their mode of exciting Charity — Misunder- standings between the Tyne Pitmen and their Masters— Com- Unations— A Stick" or Strike— Injurious consequences of the Disputes— Murder of a Magisbrate—Oibbet on Jarrow Slake... 986

Chapter Xvi.

The Coal Trade.

FossO Coal little if at all Imown to tlie nadons of Antiquity — Mentioned by Theophrastus — Supposed to hare been used by the Ancient Britons— Old Cinder Heaps— Coal mentioned by Saxon Authors— Extract from the Bolden Book"— Charter to the Inhabitants of Newcastle to dig Coals— Sea Coal— Eyidenoe of Early Modes of Working— .Hostemen— Earliest Notice of Exportation of Coals— Charitable Donations of Coals— For- merly burned along with Wood— Early states of the Coal Trade —Richmond Shillings-Complaints of the decrease end waste of Fire-wood— Historical Notice of the Introdnotien of PH Coal into common use— Erelyn's Lamentation on the Decay of Forests— Coincidence in the Deposits of Coal and Ironstone—

Contents.

in maldng Iron-NoUces of the Coal iratte on w

Wear, and Tees

Chapter Xvii.

Varieties Of Coal.

species of eacb . cod-EnitUsh, Welsh, and identify several sorto-Qnahties 'during corn- Scotch Coals-Evolution of nnconsuined matters aun g

bustion-Buming of Smoker-Stone Coal

Chapter Xviii.

CONTBYANCE Of COAL.

JrTal bSSSSw ofNavigaing Keels-Hostemen or Fittei-SS; andBiver Trade-Coal Trade of Seamen— Impressment

Chapter Xix.

The London Coal Trade.

Early UgislativeRegulations-.UseofPitCoalfonneriypr in London-Growth of the Coal Trade-Duties ld upon -Reinilation of the Vend-Charges upon a cargo of Coate at the place of Shipment, and Coastwise-Charges in the Port of London-Enactments relative to the Coal Trade-Method of transacUng business-Ship and Land Meters-Coal Bushel-- Parliamentary enquiries-Opinions of the Committees-Proposal to substitute Sale by Weight m lieu of Sale yeasure— Breakage of Coal-5ales by the Chaldron abolished by Act oi Parliament, and Sales by the Hundred weight authorised- Suspension of the Law respecting Meterage— Duties chargeable upon Coal— Discharge of the Cargoes of Vessels in the Thames —Progressive State of the Trade

Chapter Xx.

Irish, Scotch, And Welsh Coal Trade.

Importation of Coals into Ireland— Dublin supplied from White- baven— Various Coal Ports—LegislaUve Regulations— Sales by Weight and by Measure— Coals allowed to be imported duty free, for certain Manufactories— Scotland behind England in the methods of working Collieries— Coal taken to Scotland duty

Contents. Xv

free— Sold by Weigbt — Scotch Coal sent coastwise — South Welsh Trade— Newport— Small Coal, or Culm-Coal Balls 389

Chapter Xxi.

Conversion And Products Of Coal.

ManufactDTe of Toys, 8cc. from Glance Coal, Cannel Coal, and Jet— Pulverised Coal — Copperas — Bituminous products of Coal — PStch Jake— Early experiments on Mineral TarNatural Fountains of Gas— Earl of Dundonald's Patent— The Distilla- tion of Coal— First exhibition of Artificial Gas— Manufactured for purposes of Illumination— Residual Matters — Ammoniacal Liquor and Coal Tar— Incineration of Coal— Hard and Soft Coke — Processes of Preparation — Branching Coal— Smoke, Soot, and Ashes , 398

Chapter Xxii.

Home Consumption.

Extent of Home Consumption — Importance of Coal in the gene- ration of Steam — Steam Engines— Manufactures of Earthen- ware and Glass— Statements of Mr. Pellatt— Gas Works— Iron Works — Consumption of Coal in Sheffield — Manchester— Bir- mingham— Leeds— Lirerpool— London— Consumption in the United Kingdom— Tax on Coals or Hearths proposed— Waste of Coal at the Collieries 416

Chapter Xxhl

Foreign Coal Trade.

Early Notices of Exportation of Coal— During the Reigns of Henry VIII. and Queen Elizabeth— Charles the First— Act of Trade, 1663— Lord North's Reasons for taxing the Coal Trade to Foreign Ports— Produce of our Coal Fields essentially dif- ferent from that of our Manufactories — Considerations relative to Free Trade— Politic Objections to an unrestricted Foreign Vend— Opinions of Mr. Brandling and Mr. Buddie— Professor Sedgwick and Dr. Buckland— Scale of Duties on Coals im- ported, in 1831— Reduced in 1834— Duties on Coals sent abroad abolished in 1835— Impost levied on Coals at Foreign Ports- Remarks on the Policy of the Duties in the Ports of France... 435

Chapter Xxiv.

Probable Duration Of Our Coal.

DiiBcult to assign the consumption of Coal for future periods — Estimate of quantity remaining unwrought in Durham and Northumberland— Statements of Mr. Taylor and Professor Sedgwick— Decay of the Northern Mines will probably transfer

Xvi Contents.

Um London Coal Trade to Scotland and South Wales— Quantity of workable Coal probably OTenatedOpiniona of Dr. Thomson and Mr. Bakewell, relative to the duration of the Northern Collieries 454

Chapter Xxv.

FORKIGN COAL DBPOSlTfr.

Importanee of Foreign Coal Deposits to Great Britain— General Phenomena of the Carboniferous Strata similar in differeBt covntiiea— Organie Remains and aoeompanying RocksInde- pendent Coal Formation of Werner— Oocozrence of Coal in Spain-near DiesdenIn Silesia— Vast Deposits in Fnmoe In Belgium— Fire Damp—Coal Fields of Germany — FossU Fishes— Coal in Sweden, Norway, and Poland— Inmiense De- positories of Anthracite and Bituminous Coal in North America — Scarcity of Fuel in some parts of South America— Rhode Island, Canada, and Australia contain Coal — Strata on Fire at Cape Breton— European Localities of lignite and FossU Wood. 464

Chapter

INTRODUCTORY— FraE AND FUEL.

Fire — Its obvious properties — Corpmcular and iin- dulatory theories — Sources 0/ Fire — The Sun — Lightning — Chemical action — Notices of the pro duction of Fire by friction — Uses of Fire — In connexion with Religion — For culinary purposes — For promoting personal comfort — In the opera- tions of Metallurgy and the Arts — Agents or sup- porters of Combustion — Bituminous and animal substances J or products — Dung and Sea-weed — Peat, Wood, and Mineral Fuels .

r IRE according to the old writers, is one of the four primary qualities or conditions of matter, or in other words, that elementary substance which has the property of devouring other bodies, — the other three elements, according to the ancient theory, being air earth, and water : to speak more philosophically, it is that subtle substance by pervasion with which bodies are rendered hot to the touch, and, if previously solid, become at a certain temperature fluid, and are after- wards either carried off in vapour or melted into glass : or by the application of which, fluids, as com- monly spoken of, are rarefied into vapour. In the most

B

2 Fire And Fuel.

ordinary sense. Fire is understood to mean matter in a state of combustion or incandescence : and it is in this acceptation more particularly, that tlie term is used in the present work. During the eighteenth century, the supposed general principle of heat, or inflammability, was called phlogistion, a term invented to suit the theory of Stahl, which assumed and thus designated such principle, as a constituent element of all combustibles. But Lavoisier, who died in 1794, introduced a new theory, depending on the existence of what is called caloric, a denomination universally adopted by modem chemists. It assumes that combustion is caused by the combination of the oxygen of tlie atmosphere, not with hydrogen, or with the imaginary substance of phlogistion, but with the combustible itself, and that in such combination light and heat are produced.* It would be out of place in a work like the present, to enter into any lengthened investigation of the nature of this agency to which the phenomena of light and heat are ascribed ; or in what respects it seems to fail to account for some existing facts. It may be remarked, however that by one class of theorists, heat has been hypothetically regarded as a fluid of inappreciable tenuity, whose particles are endowed with indefinite ideo-repulsive powers, and which, by their distribution in various proportions among the particles of ponderable matter, modify cohesive attraction, giving biilh to the three general forms of gaseous, liquid, and solid.f Another class of philosophers, among whom ranks the cele- brated Sir Humphrey Davy, have doubted the sepa- rate entity of a calorific matter and have adduced

♦ Lardner's Treatise on Heat, p. 365. f Dr. Ure,

Theories Of Heat. 3

evidence to shew tliat the phenomena might rather he referred to a vibratory or intestinal motion of tlie par* tides of common matter. Under no circumstance3, notwithstanding that philosophers have paid the mi- nutest attention to the subject, does it appear that the communication of heat has ever been found to make any appreciale addition to the gravity of tlie matter pervaded by it, which, if it were a substance suigene" ris, we might be led to expect. Dr. Lardner, how- ever remarks that '' the material theory has the ad vantage of offering an easily intelligible explanation of the phenomena of heat, so far as it is at all appli- cable or satisfactory. On the other hand, the vibra- tory theory is involved in the difficulty of requiring more acute powers of mind to apprehend its force, or even to understand any of its applications. Indeed, it would scarcely admit of full exposition without the use of the language and symbols of the higher Ma- thematics ; but, perhaps, the strongest support which the vibratory theory can derive, is from the facts which render it probable that light and heat are iden- tical. If,'* adds the Doctor, " the fdentity of heat and light be admitted, then the question of the nature of heat is removed to that of light, respectbg wliich two theories have been proposed, precisely similar to those of heat ; viz., the corpuscular and the undula- tory theories. Both of these theories sen e to explain the bulk of optical phenomena; but some effects, discovered by modem investigation in physical optics, are considered to be more satisfactorily explained by the undulatory theory : the question, however, re- mains unsettled.'' From an examination of these

Treatise on Heat, p. 398. B 2

4 Fire And Fuel.

and otlier theories, enough will be learned to shew how little room there is to pronounce dogmatic deci- sions on the abstract natm'e of heat. But, as Dr. Ure justly remarks — if the source of the cause be still involved in mystery, many of its properties and effects have been ascertained, and skilfully applied to the cultivation of science and the uses of life.

The primary sources of fire are very various in their technical sub-divisions : they may, however, be generally included in the following distribution, com- prising those that may be termed natural, as well as those that are artificial: — 1. The Sun. — 2. Light- ning.— 3. Chemical combinations.— 4. Friction or collision.

1 . The most obvious source of igneous action with which mankind has always been familiar, is un- doubtedly that orb irom whence our earth is indebted for light and heat. It is not, indeed, probable tliat the earliest fires kindled by the progenitors of the human race were derived immediately from tliis lu- minaiy — as they could not be acquainted with the method of collecting its rays by the burning glass, nor of concentrating them by the concave mirror : it is now, however, well known, that in some parts of the world vegetable and other matters may be in a state of dryness and inflammability, sufficient to allow them to become ignited by the mere action of the solar heat upon them.

2. Lightning, although happily for mankind not a common agent of terrestrial inflammation, is much less rarely so tiian the sun. While the instances of combustion through the influence of a emp de soleU strike us as uncommon, not a year passes but we hear of the fatal or destructive consequences of what

Sources Of Fire. O

is called, with equal poetry and truth, by the common people, the "falling of the thimderbolt:" and al- though a sudden consumption, torrefaction, or at least piercing, of the object stricken, is the more usual phenomenon, jet the works of man, forests, and even beds of coal, are sometimes set on fire by the electric flash.

3. The most remarkable, active, and violent local sources of fire on the large scale of nature are, how- ever, those vast magazines of chemical action — vol- canoes. At what period man first became acquainted with the outbreaks of these tremendous laboratories of nature, or how nearly he at first approached them, we do not know: we have, however, accounts of eruptions which date firom a very remote antiquity ; and, according to some theorists, these reservoirs of central fire are coeval with the present formation of our planet — the earth being, in fact, according to Whiston, an extinct comet, the crust of which has cooled down to its present temperature, while the core is still in a state of fusion. Akin to this notion, is the theory of that class of geologists called the Plutonists, who contend that the greater dislocations of the various strata of which, so far as we know, the earth is composed, and the various combinations into which these have obviously entered with each other, are attributable to igneous action, in opposition to the Neptunists, or disciples of Werner, who pretend that water has been the principal agent in the pro- duction of those phenomena which it is in the pro- vince of the geologist to investigate and classify. To say nothing of those scientific contrivances by means of which Modem Chemistry has furnished the world with so many sources from which fire may be derived.

6 Fire And Fuel.

it is well known that sulphureous or bituminous ex- halations or what may be called " fountains of fire," exist in various parts of the world ; and although the matter of these gaseous vents is more frequently in- flamed by art, yet there seems no reason to doubt but that they may have been occasionally lighted by a concurrence of natural causes, and even have offered to man some of the earliest opportunities for transfer- ring ignition to a more substantial pabulum ; as well as afforded those flames, at which was very early lighted the torch of superstition.

4. As, however, we find that the process of pro- curing fire by many savage nations at this day is by rubbing two pieces of dry wood together until they inflame by the friction, so we may presume that this would be the original method resorted to for the arti- ficial procuration of fire in the first ages of the world. This effect, indeed, if we may believe ancient authors, has sometimes been produced by the operation of natural causes, and that too on a large scale : for they tell us of the conflagration of forests by Uie violent rubbing together of the tall trunks of resinous trees during strong winds.* The quaint old French poet, Du Bartus, who found a most doggerel English translator in Joshua Sylvester, at the beginning of the reign of James I., has, in his Devine Weeks

Conflagrations from the cause alluded to, appear to be far fVom uncom- mon in some parts of India, The Rev. H. Caunter, describing a fire which swept up the sides the mountains skirting the Coadnar Ghaut, near Calcutta, forming a sea of fire to the extent of several miles, informs us, that this striking phenomenon is not by any means uncommon, and is ac- counted for by the larger bamboos, as they are swayed by the wind, emitting fire from their hard glossy stems through the violence of their friction, and thus spreading destruction through the mountain forests." — Oriental Annual,

Friction And Collision. 7

and Works/' a curious passage describing how the first man invented fire, for the use of himself and his posterity. The passage is prolix; but the fancj which represents Adam and Eve as approaching so nearly the invention of the tinder-box, has thrown an air of singularity over the story, sufficient to repay its perusal. Our first Parents having been cast out of Paradise had, according to the poet, made them- selves a dwelling ; —

Yet fire they lack*t : but lo, the windes that whistle Amid the groues, so oft the Laarell iiuit]e Against the Malbeiy, that their angry claps Do kindle fire that burns the neighbour cops.

When Adam saw a ruddy vapour rise In glowing sti-eams ; astund with fear he flyes. It follows him, vntil a naked plain The greedy fuiy of the flame restrain : Then back he turns, and comming somwhat niglicr The kindled shrubs, i)erceiving that the fire Dries his dank cloathes, his colour doth refresh. And unbenums his sinews and his flesh ; By th* ynbumt end a good big brand he takes. And hying home a fire be quickly makes. And still maintains it till the starry twins' Celestial breath another fire begins.

But Winter being comm again it griev'd him, have lost so fondly what so much relieved him. Trying a thousand ways, sith now no more The iustling trees his domage would restore.

While, elsewhere musing, one day he sat down Vpon a steep rock's craggy forked crown, A foaming beast come toward him he spies. Within whose head stood burning coals for eyes : Then suddainly with boisterous arm he throwes A knobbie flint that hummeth as it goes ; Hence flies the beast, th' il-aimed flinthaft grounding Against the rock, and on it oft rebounding, Shivers to cinders, whence there issued Small sparks of fire no sooner bom than dead.

8 Fire And Fuel.

This happy chance made Adain leap for glee, Aud quickly calling his cold companies In his lefl hand a shining flint he locks. Which with another in his right he knocks So vp and down, that from the coldest stone At every stroak small fiery sparkles shone. Then with the dry leaves of a withered hay The which together handsomely they lay. They take the falling fire, which like a smi Shines cleer and smoakless in the leaf heguu. Eve, kneeling down, with hand her head sustaining. And on the low groimd with her elbow leaning, Blowes with her mouth : and with her gentle blowing Stirs up the heat, that from the dark leaves glowing. Kindles the reed, and then that hollow kix First fires the small, and they the greater sticks."

The accounts given by Cook and other circum- navigators, of the method practised by the South Sea Islanders for obtaining fire by friction, have been abundantly verified by recent voyagers. Tlie follow- ing exceedingly intelligible description of the pro- cess as practised at Tahite, is from the Journal of Voyages and Travels by the Rev. Daniel Tyennan and George Bennet, Esq. in the South Sea Islands, &c." compiled by Mr. Montgomery. " We had an opportunity," say the Journalists, " of observing the simple and ingenious process by which the island- ers obtain fii'e. A man took a piece of dry purau wood, twelve inches long, and two thick. With another stick of the same tree, sharpened to a point, and held with both his hands, at an angle of about 45°, he rubbed the former gently, as it lay on the ground, till he had scratched a groove in it several inches long. Then continuing the same operation, but pressing the point hai'dcr upon the lower piece, and increasing the velocity of the motion, some brown

Uses Of Fire. 0

dust was soon formed withiatlie groove, and collected at one end. In a few seconds smoke was apparent, and the dust was ignited. The spark was then im mediately conveyed into a finger-hole opened in a handful of dry grass. The man hlew upon it, and waving the tuft in the air, the grass was quickly in a flame. The whole experiment did not occupy more than two minutes.'*

Various as are the sources firom which fire may be obtained, the purposes to which it has been applied are inconceivably more diversified. To enumerate all these purposes would be impossible : it may, how ever, be interesting to mention the heads, to one or other of which most of the objects in lighting up artificial fires may be referred : —

I. In connexion with Religion :

II. For culinary purposes :

III. For promoting personal comfort by means of warmth : and

IV. For the various operations of Metallurgy and the Arts.

I. Under the first of these heads we are called upon to notice the application of fire for a purpose infinitely difierent from the three that follow, and also to recognise a derivation of the element not in the slightest degree referable to any of the before- mentioned sources ; — we allude to the consuming of the animal sacrifices under the Patriarchal and Mo- saic institutions of the Old Testament, by " fire from

Other Authorities describe the plan as consisting in giving a rapid mo- tion to a pointed stick, in the manner of a vertical spindle ; by neither method, however, docs it appear that Europeans have been able to effect that which they saw the savages so readily accomplish.

10 Fire And Fuel.

heaven/' It is probable that the fire which was kept burning on the altars in the Temple at Jerusalem was so derived, as the element visibly descended and consumed the sacrifice when the Lord made a covenant with Abraham, when Moses dedicated the Tabernacle, and when Solomon dedicated the Temple : it was always considered sacred, and the ofiering with ''strange fire*' was considered an abomination in the sight of Je ho vah. Besides its important application as an auxiliary in the Hebrew sacrifiture, fire became an object of actual worship with several Gentile na tions in the East. The Chaldeans accounted it a divinity ; and in the province of Babylon there was a city called Ur, or of fire, consecrated to this usage. The Persians also adored God under the similitude of fire, because it is fire that gives motion to every thing in Nature : they had temples called Pyroea, or fire temples, set apart for the preservation of the sacred element. The priests among the Persian fire- worshippers are called Ghebers, and a splendid chap- ter is devoted to the subject of their mysteries in Moore's exquisite poem of '' Lalla Rookh." They are said to have fires at present subsisting among them that have been burning several thousand years.f In Old Rome, fire was worshipped in honour of the goddess Vesta, and virgins called vestals were ap-

Catholic writers tell ns, that on Good Friday an interdictioQ ensued in the Bomish Charch, and all the fires were totally eztingaiahed. Conae- qnently, it was usual to proride charcoal on Easter ere, for renewing the BxeB on Easter day; when, however, they were kindled again, it was done by elemental fire inrodnoed by flint and steel, and not flnom unhallowed em- bers. From this fire, the Paschal-taper was also lighted.

f So superstitiously do the Panees regard the element of fire, that if a conflagration brealcs out, instead of endeavouring to quench it with water, they pull down the houses liable to be consumed, that the Are may go out for want of combustible matter to feed it. In their temples they keep fires of the most costly woods constantly burning.

Man, A Fire-Making Animal. 11

pointed to keep it up. Other nations, as tlie Grauls, and some of the aboriginal American tribes paid veneration to fire*

II. The earliest application of fire for civil or do- mestic uses, would undoubtedly be in the cooking of victuals : for no nation has hitherto been discovered in such a state of barbarism as to be unacquainted with the arts of procuring and the cidinary applica- tion of fire. Man, indeed, among many other whim- sical definitions of the genus HomOj has been called a fire-making animal/' because it has been asserted that he of all creatures is capable of procuring, keep- ing up, and turning to account factitious combustion. Although. lighting fires and waving brands are among the means adopted to frighten away wild beasts from the presence of man, many of the inferior animals are known to be exceedingly fond of artificial warmth ; but they have no instincts conformable to the means of procuring it for themselves. Even apes, the most sagacious imitators of the actions of man, fond as they generally are of basking near a fire, appear to have no instinct which leads them to rake together the fibers, or add more fuel to prevent it from, expiring. This may be regarded as an obvi- ously wise arrangement of Providence ; for had that mischievous disposition which so commonly charac-

Among the Hindoos, a great nnmber of mystical ceremonies and invo- cations are referred to Paraki as the regent of fire. Tliis fire<king is, how- erer, more commonly worshipped nnder the name of Agni; and the follow- ing, according to the insHtntions of Menu, is one of the common Brahmtni- cal inrocations of that deity:—" Fire! Seren aie thy Aiels; seren thy tongues ; seven thy holy sages ; seven thy helored ahodes ; seven ways do seren sacrifices worship thee ; thy soarces are seven ; may this ohlation be efficacious ! " An explanation of this mysterious passage has been given by Mr. Colebrooke, in his Essay on the Religious Ceremonies of the Hindoos, in the seventh volume of the Asiatic Researches."

12 Fire And Fuel.

terises Uie Simla species, been extended to a fond- ness for playing with ignited matters the conse- quences might have been disastrous indeed; for what meddlesome monkey would not have been lia- ble, could he have picked up a lighted brand, to have become the Erostratus of his own particular forest !

III. The use of fire for the purpose of promoting personal comfort, by raising the temperature of some portion of the surrounding atmosphere, although co extensive with its application to the cooking of vic- tuals in our own and several other countries, is never- theless by no means of so common occurrence in tropical and other warm climates. In Northern Europe, Asia, and America, the amount of fuel con- sumed for this purpose alone is prodigious ; and, cer- tainly, no where more than in England, is the luxury of what are called good fires '' carried to an extent which, independently of other considerations, renders the subject discussed in the following pages one of paramount importance in a commercial, as well as physical, point of view. Every dwelling-house iu the kingdotn, however small or poor — and, it may be added, nearly every temple of reUgion, as weU as every shop, mill, and manufactory — each has its ap- propriate apparatus for keeping up internal wtrmth and is for the most part thus linked to the importance of the coal trade. It modifies, indeed, but does not

It has indeed been said, that the tall monkeys of Borneo and Sumatra not only lie doim with pleasure round any accidental fire in their woods, " but," it is added, " they are arrived to that degree of reason, that know- ledge of causation, that they thrust into the remaining fire the half -burnt ends of the branches, to prevent its going out" The reality of this fact, especially as connected with " that knowledge of causallnn" which is just mentioned, appears more than doubtfuL

Warmth, And Smelting. 13

destroy, die miportance of this connection, wliether the modem modes adopted for heating be regarded as consisting of any of the innumerable varieties of stores, hot-air vessels, steam machines, or the more recent contrivances for wanning apartments by means of pipes circulating water in a state of ebullition — all are dependent upon the combustion of more or less of ignited matter in the state of fueL

IV. The most important application of fire, how- ever, is in the smelting of ores, the working of me- tals, and the carrying forwards those chemical opera- tions on a large scale for which Great Britain and several other countries are so celebrated. The know- ledge of the effect of heat in separating metallic par-* tides from the earthy or other masses in which they might be found embedded, is of the highest antiquity; and firom the days of Tubal Cain, the first instruct tor of all artificers in iron and brass,'' to the present time, mankind have attached increasing importance to metallurgic operations, and to the arts depending thereupon. And, not only from the records of the earliest ages, but from almost every section of the globe inhabited by man, whether in a savage or a civilized state, we derive fresh materials for evidence in illustration of the dominion which human industry and ingenuity have sought to establish over the mi- neral kingdom by the agency of fire. Some parti- culars relative to the different substances used as fuel, may appropriately close this Chapter.

Of the agents of combustion, as defined by the strict nomenclature of Modem Chemistry, it is not necessary, in this place, to take farther notice than briefly to remark that some of these four substances — oxygen chlorine, bromine, and iodine-being, almost

14 Fire And Fuel,

in every case, one of the two bodies by the combina- tion of which combustion is produced, and the other matters with which they severally combine being far more numerous, the four just mentioned are distin guished, relatively to the phenomena of combustion, by the name supporters of combustion ; while the other body forming the combination with them, whal ever it may be, is called a combustible.*

Reverting to less scientific phraseology, it may be remarked, that, whatever substance is either capable of being inflamed, or of remaining in a state of in- candescence, may come, in a certain sense, under the denomination of fuel. Hence, certain liquids, as alcohol, oil, &c., with all resinous, bituminous, and fatty matters on the one hand j and on the other, several fossil productions, with the intermediate vari- eties of structure, and ligneous bodies in general, may be at once referred to, as comprising the classes of bodies commonly used as supporters of combustion. Inflammable fluids, in any place, are more rarely used for the production of heat than of light j and in this country, purely bituminous products are almost as seldom applied, by themselves, to the purposes of firing : in some parts of the world the case is widely difierent. Large quantities of naphtha are obtained on the shores of the Caspian sea ; and the inhabitants of Baku, one of its ports, are supplied with no other fuel than that obtained fix)m the naphtha and petro- leum, with which the neighbouring country is highly impregnated. In the island of Wetoy, and on tlie peninsula of Apcheron, this substance is said to be very abundant, supplying immense quantities which

Lardner's Treatise on Heat, p. 365.

Agents Of Combustion. 15

are carried awaj. The inhabkante of other parts of the world, in the vidnitj of Asphaltum springs, have recourse to the like substances for the purposes as well of cooking as of illumination ; for which ob* jects, also the springs of natural gas are sometimes econoroicallj applied.

Among some of the eastern nations, the dung of the camel and other herbivorous animals is carefully collected and dried for fiiel. A number of curious particulars illustrative of this fact as regards the Jews are collected by Hanner.f A similar practice formerly prevailed in some of the midland counties of this

kingdom.!

Animal matter is sometimes, though rarely, used as fuel. The Arabs, however, who dwell in that part of their country bordering on Egypt, must be re- garded as forming in some degree an exception to the remark ; for they draw no inconsiderable portion of the fuel with which they cook their victuals from the exhausdess mmnmy-pits, so often described by travellers. The extremely dry state of the bodies, and the inflammable nature of the matters with which they have apparently been saturated, during the pro* cess of embalming, render them exceedingly conve- nient for the above purpose. We have a still more striking instance : wood was formerly so scarce at Buenos Ayres, and cattle so plentiful, that sheep were

Edin. VML Joiunaly ?oL t.

f It is from the soot collected during the oombiution of this Aiel that the Egypticns procnie faommofitac, by simple sablimfttion.

;( The droppiBgs of the cows were coUeeted into heaps, and beaten into a mass with water: then pressed by the feet into moalds liloe briols, by regu- lar professional persons, ealled datters (clodders) ; then dried in tiie sun, and stacked like peat, and a dry March for the dat-harrest was considered tA yery desirable. — Journal of a NaiwralUt,

16 Fire And Fuel.

actually driven into tlie furnaces of lime-kilns iu order to answer the purposes of fuel. Tliis fact could hardly have been mentioned as credible, however undoubted, if a decree of the King of Spain, prohi- biting this barbarous custom, were not still preserved intlie archives of Buenos Ayres.

The inhabitants of the sea-coasts, who happen to be remote from better fael, or too poor to obtain it, collect sea-weed (Fucus vesiculostis, lAnn.) and such like stuff for firing — an indifferent enough material for the purpose, as may readOy be supposed. In the Norman Isles, sea-weed is assiduously gathered by the inhabitants, both for fuel and manure : it is called in French varech, and in the Jersey dialect " vraic."*

The most convenient, and happily the most abun- dant, kinds of fuel known in this and most civilised countries, are peat, dried wood, charcoal, and fossil coal, either in the state in which it is raised fi'om the mine, or in the condition of coke. The history of peat, as immediately coming within the design of the present work, will form the subject of the next Chapter ; while wood fiiel will be subsequently ad- verted to, in connection with those vicissitudes to which the iron and other trades in this country were exposed, during their transition firom a dependence upon our decaying forests, to those inexhaustible depositories of coal, descriptions of the history, work- ing, and commercial importance of which can scarcely fail to impart a lively interest to the ensuing pages.

The season of collecting this Bubstitnte for coal and firewood is made a season of menriment in Jersey ; the times of yraicldng are appointed by the island legislature, and then multitudes of carts, horses, boats, and Traidcers eoTer the beach, the rocks, and the Channel Jilands,*' vol. i. p. 99.

Chapter Ii.

Geological Theories.

Interesting character of Geological Science — Extent of knowledge required /or successful investigation — Controversies and conflicting theories — Important connexion between Geology and Revelation — Ques tion of progressive developement of Species — Hut ton and Werner — Subterranean temperature — Pa roxysmai and Caiaclysmal Eras of MM. Beavr- fnont, Brongniarty and Cuvier — Jameson's Remarks — Mineral and Mosaical Geologies contrasted — Fairholme — Theory of Werner — Tabular view of the positions of Strata — Formations — Gradation of Fossils of vegetable origin.

L HE science of Geology, a science still in its infancy, has been pursued of late years with an ardour commensurate to the importance of its bearings in relation to the physical structure of the earth, no less than afi developing a series of phenomena of the most striking and interesting character. Nor is the study of this comprehensive subject at present confined in its scientific attractions to divines and philosophers on the one hand, nor on the other hand is it left to miners and metallurgists alone to estimate its practical im-

18 Geological Theories.

portance. It has become essential to a liberal educa- tion, that a man know something of the stratification of the globe upon which he lives, and to the fossil and mineral riches of which he is so largely indebted. Even under the softer designation of an accom- plishment, some acquaintance with the principles of Geology is not unfrequently acquired by individuals of both sexes as a source of elegant intellectual re- creation. Formerly, indeed, the few learned men who paid attention to this science, if science it could then be called, did so, either as the devisers and de- fenders of capricious theories, or as the champions or opponents of revelation, just as those theories were considered favourable or immical to the Mosaic ac- counts of the Creation and the Deluge. To these learned controversies it is unnecessary farther to allude, as the present remarks are intended merely to introduce such a brief glimpse of geological doc- trines as may enable the general reader, in some degree, to understand the relative position of the beds of mineral coal among those numerous and diversified strata, with which the investigations of art and science / have made us acquainted.

The study of Geology in the extended sense, and as the subject is treated by recent writers, such as De la Beche and Lyell particularly the latter, whose volu- minous work is extremely interesting, — requires a comprehensive knowledge of geography, meteorology, anatomy, conchology, botany, and natural philosophy in general. For it is only to persons somewhat con* versant with the manner in which these and numeroua other branches of physical investigation are made to bear upon the modes of accounting for various phe- nomena, discoverable in the present and recorded of

Importance Of Geology. 19

past states of the earths crust, that tlie interest of tlie science can be rendered greatly apparent. The ele- vation of mountain-masses, the formation of valleys, the recession or encroachment of the sea, the pheno- mena of rivers and lakes, the activity of volcanoes, thermal springs, and the operation of numerous other causes, give rise to speculations which call forth the most ample resources of knowledge for their support, elucidation, or correction.

In the developement of phenomena consequent on these enquiries, it is certainly not surprising that the reverers of the most ancient and authentic historical dociunent in the world, should at all times have felt sensibly alive to whatever was put forth as evidence on this subject, whether appearing to confirm or to Oppose the sacred cosmogony of the Book of Genesis. It must be admitted, however, that the advocates of the integrity of the sacred record have sometimes committed diemselves and their righteous cause, by the exercise of a zeal not according to knowledge. Thdr error, to speak of it comprehensively, has been twofold : in the first place, they have hastily confided the sustentation of the credit of the Mosaic account to one plausible hypothesis or another, and these fail- ing, by the discovery that their foundations were not laid in physical facts, the enemies of revelation have assumed, still more unwarrantably, that the whole fabric of Divine Truth must be one of equal instabi- lity : in the second place, they have too often spoken and written as if, admitting the inspired authenticity of a passage, we are compelled to adopt as infallible its commonly received interpretation. This is, con- fessedly, a delicate point, and one in all disquisitions connected with which too great a degree of precaution

20 Geological Theories.

cannot be exercised ; but it must be exercised on the part of the divine as well as the geologist ; for, while the latter produces facts, apparently in overwhelming abundance, to shew that certain notions long enter- tained may possibly be unfounded, and submits that the advocates of revelation act unwisely in forcing interpretations at variance with phenomena, — the former has no right to place an issue of so much im- portance to mankind as the credibility of the Bible History, on the very dangerous presumption that no scheme of explanation, no method of reconciling seeming discrepancies, surpassing his own, can ever be attained to.

. Let it not be supposed for a moment, from what is here said, that it is intended to undervalue the labours of those who have sought to reconcile the modem discoveries in Geology with the commonly received interpretations of the Mosaic accounts of the creation and the deluge ; much less to throw any slight on the successfdl efforts of those who have shewn what may be accomplished in this way ; nor, least of all, let it be imagined that any apprehension is enter- tained, as if the testimony of physical phenomena can ever be opposed to the spirit of divine revelation. A competent authority has declared, that " the facts developed by Geology are consistent with the accounts of the creation and deluge, as recorded in the Mosaic writings." It is against that presumptive principle which strives to make theology and physics, studies essentially distinct, the vehicles of perpetual reprisal, that the present caution is directed.

A passing allusion to the systems of Hutton and

BacUand's Vindicias Geologies.

Agencies Of Fire And Water. 21

Werner, usually recognisied as the Plutonian and the / Neptunian, from die paramount importance attached bj the one to the agency of fire, and by the other to that of water, in the formation of our globe, has al- ready been .made in the preceding Chapter. The aibsurd lengths to which some of the abettors of these Gonflicting theories have occasionally gone, in deriv- ing plausible generalizations from insulated or local phenomena, have taught modem geologists a useful lesson ; and the man would now be thought insane who,, overlooking the multitudinous examples of the ondoubted agency of both causes on a large scale, should invoke, for the elanation of all difficulties, the genius of either fire or water exclusively. Many of the phenomena of the rocky masses exhibit une- quivocal traces of their double origin — in the one case of refirigeration from igneous fusion, and in the other of concretion from aqueous solution* While some philosophers have assumed, that the central nucleus of our globe is in all probability ponderable matter in a condition of amazing density, others have imagined a cavity filled with water; and an American speculatist believed it to be hollow, and even accessible from the extreme north. Whatever be the matter occupying the " centre of our sphere," it may be presumed to exist in a state of such prodigious compression, as to present conditions little if at all analagous to matter in any mode with which we are . acquainted with it.

The long-agitated question as to whether the tem- perature of our planet increases towards the centre or not, has received little illustration from facts : the assertion, therefore, that the increment of temperature corresponds on the average to about 1 ° Fahi'enheit for

/

22 Geological Theories.

every seVeu fathoms of descent, rests rather on theory tlian experience. It must be obvious that theimome- trical results obtained in mines, with the utmost pre- caution, are very liable to prove fallacious ;—<;on- ducted, however, by skill and experience, they may become of importance.

With reference to the great outlines of two con- flicting geological theories, to which more especial attention has been excited of late, it may be briefly observed, that one, and that the longest and most generally entertained, assumes the creation of the matter of our globe to have taken place about six thousand years ago ; that in six days, of twenty-four hours each,f it was not only modified into terrene, aqueous, and aerial relations, but also replenished with veiretable and animal life; subsequently to which primeval setdement, ithas dergone one eat catastrophe by water 3 — and that this, along with the

For a series of interesting experiments of this class, made by John Phil- lips, Esq., F.O.S., in one of the deepest mines in the world, and under rery faTonrable drcamstances, vide London and Edinburgh PhiLJomn. Dtc. 1834.

f The well-known American Professor Silliman has put a question which is intended as an experimtnium cntds for the interpretation adverted to. Supposing,'* says the Professor, " that there are inhabitants at the poles of ihe earth, how mnst they understand the days of the creation! To them a day of light is six months long, and a night of darkness six months long ; and the day, made up of night and day, coTors a year; and it is a day, too, limited by morning and evening. Such persons, therefore, mnst suppose, upon the literal understanding of the days of creation, that at least six years were employed upon the work. So also at the polar-circles, there is every year one day — that is, one continued vision of the sun for twenty- four hours and one continued night of twenty- four hours : while every where within the polar-circles, the days and the nights respectively are for six months more than twenty- four houn, extending even, as we advance towards the poles, through the time of many of our days and nights. How are the in- habitants of these regions to understand the week of the creation, if limited to the literal interpretation of the inspired record r' Surely the above is philosophical trifling, to designate it by no harsher a term. Do the Lap- landers ever regard the period of absence of the sun during their winter as tho measure of their night f

Conflicting Opinions. 23

operation of caiises still going on, are sufficient to account for all the phenomena observed in the present structure of the earth. The other theory inferring from the appearance and situation of certain fossilised organic reliquiae, a much higher antiquity as to the origin of our planet, admits the creation of man, and perhaps of the animals which now surround him,* at the period commonly assigned, and even recog- nises the great diluvial event announced in the Bible; but it likewise assumes a progressive developement of organised existence,f and contends for a succescdon

It is a remarkable circamstenee, and one which has been taken at oor- roboratiTe of the hypotheds of the tnuucendant antiquity of certain deponta of the reliquiae of the ilmplest types of animai oianization, that the remains of homan beings are no where fonnd embedded, even among the reliqnes of the more perfect mammalia, until we come to the strata of comparatirely leoent origin. Skeletons of men, mora or less mutilated, bare been found in the West Indies, on the coast at Guadalonpe. One of these fossil skele- tons is in the British Museum, and another in the Royal Cabinet at Paris. The antiquity of these remans has giren rise to some discnsrion : but the lest geologists assign them to a modem era. The rock in which they am enclosed is Itnown to be forming daily ; it consLsts of minute fragments of sheHs and corals, incmsted with a calcareous cement resembling tra?ertin, and altogether not unlike the red conglomerate of the rook of Gibraltar, so fan of the bones of apes, &c. While the absence ot human remains in the older strata is admitted, it must not at the same time be forgotten, that those regions where the human family is beliered to hare originated, and oTer which its descendants first spread themselves, hae been little explored by geologists. This cirsumstance has been dwelt upon by Mr. Lyell, who has also adverted to the consideration that, as there is no reason why the bones of men should, under any drcumstanoes, be less imperishable than those of quadrupeds, with which they are sometimes fonnd well preserved in peaty, fluviatile, and other recent stations, we do not despair of the discovery of such monuments, whenever those regions wliich have been peopled by man fkom the eariiest ages, and which are at the same time the principal theatres of volcanic action, shall be examined by the joint skill of the antiquaiy and the geologist."— PnnctpM Geoloyy, U. 365.

The theoiy of progressive perfectabili has been most ingeniously and indefatigably carried out by the celebrated French naturalist Lamarck, in his Zoological system. He remarks, that if we examine the whole series of Imown animals, from one extremity to the other, when they are arranged in the order of their natural relations, we find that we may pass progressively, or at least with very few interruptions, frem beings of more simple to those of

24 Geological Theories.

of catastrophies by means of which tlie primitive forms have been overthrown aad entombed many thousands of years before the advent of the first human pair. Of course, this theory requires us to concede, at least, that the first verses of the Mosaic account must bear a much looser interpretation than that which is usually given to them ; and it is mainly to the views taken as to the importance or non-im- portance of such concession, that we must attribute the miinrns of many of the discussions on either sdde. The question is confessedly important ; and even Werner himself, whose system is now chiefly recog- nised in Europe, is said, on the testimony of one of his distinguished disciples,* to have expressed him- self, " out of respect for the Sacred Scriptures," cau-

more compound straoture; and in proportion as the complexity of their organization incroaaes, the nnmher and dignity of their fiscaltiea increase also. Among plants a similar approximation to a graduated scale of being is apparent. Referring to geological phenomena, he assumes that the pri- / meval ocean inrested our planet entirely, long after it became the habitation of living beings, and thus he was inclined to assert the priority of the types of marine animals to those of the terrestrial, and to fancy, for example, that the testacea of the ocean existed first, until some of them, by gradual evolu- tion, were improred" into those inhabiting the land. Accordingly, in conformity to these views, inert matter was supposed to have been first en- dowed with life ; until, in the course of ages, sensation was superadded to mere yitality ; sight, hearing, and the other senses were afterwards required; and then instinct and the mental faculties, until finally, by virtue of the tendency of things to progressice improvement, the irrational was devel(q;ed into the rational;" — in short, the ape became a man! This hypothesis of the transmutation of species is clearly stated and ably exposed in the second Tolume of LyeU's Principles of Geology. Adverting to the almost entire absence of the remains of mammiferous quadrupeds in the more ancient formations, and particularly to the absence of all traces of creation's lord,*' this delightful author adds,—" The recent origin of man, and the absence of all signs of any rational being holding an analogous relation to former states of the animate world, affords one and the only reasonable argument in support of the hypothesis of a progressive scheme, but none whatever in . favour of the fancied evolution of one sjMicies out of another."

D*Aubis6on, tom. i., p. 369.

ANTIQUmr OF MATTER. 25

tioaaly on the question of those deluges and revolu- tions of nature, which some of the German scholars of this great master have so boldly called to their aid in the solution of the difficulties they met with.

The indefinite antiquity of the matter of omr globe has not only been contended for by geologists : — divines themselves have leaned to a similar opinion, as being not inconsistent with the Mosaic record : of this sentiment was the present Bishop of Chester. M. Elie de Beaumont, a celebrated French geologist, fRipposes that in the history of the earth there have been long periods of comparative repose, during which the deposition of sedimentary matter has gone on in regular continuity ; and there have also been short periods of paroxysmal violence during which C

that continuity was broken/* The circumstances of some of these movements are hinted at ; among the rest, the instantaneous upheaving of great mountain masses, which would cause a violent agitatioi) in the waters of the sea ; and the rise of the Andes may, perhaps, have produced that transient deluge which is noticed among the traditions of so many nations/' This hypothesis of successive revolutions, or " Geog- nostic epochs," as they are termed by Brongniart, is ably examined by Mr. Lyell, whose opinion is in

" According to that [the Mosaic] hiBtory, we are bound to admit that onlj one general destruction or reyolution of the globe has taken place, since the period of that creation which Moses records, and of which Adam and Eye were the first inhabitants. The certainty of one event of that kind would appear from the discoveries of geologers, even If it were not declared by the sacrad historian. But we are not called upon to deny the possible existence of previous worlds, from the wreck of whidi our globe was oigan- ised, and the ruins of which are now furnishing matter to our curiosity. The belief of their existence is indeed consistent with rational probability, and somewhat confirmed by the discoveries of astronomers as to the plurality of worlds.'*— Sumiier'j Records of the CrealUm voL i., p. 342. 4th Edition.

26 Geological Theories.

favour of the novel theory which accounts for all geological phenomena on the principle of a reiterated recurrence of minor convulsions, similar to those which still occasionally take place, and their having acted through an inconceivably long period of time. Either of these schemes calls upon us for too implicit a cre- dence in the exclusion of reasonable causes and re- corded events. In reference to the latter theory, Mr. Conybeare justly remarks, that historical records and the very nature and physical possibilities of the case, alike compel us to dissent entirely from those crude and hasty speculations which would assign to the causes now in action, the power of producing any very material change in the face of things; and which would refer to these alone, acting under their present conditions, and with only their present forces, the mighty operations which have formed and modified our continents."!

In reference to Cuvier's theory of a succession of deluges, and after admitting that many of the phe- nomena of diluvial action taking place before our eyes may seem to favour such a notion, Mr. Jameson ; remarks, '' What has just been said does not entitle us to admit that the various parts of the earth have been from time to time overflowed with water. Yet

To Uiose who happen not to haTO seen Mr. Lyell** able work, it may be proper to mention, that, while it is what it professes to be— <'an attempt to/ explain the foimer changes of the earth's sorfaoe, by reference to causes now in operation," in opposition to the assamption of a series of convulsiye cata- clysms, it, at the same time, challenges for the Tarioos changes adveited to what will probably be as reluctantly conceded — an infinitesimal period ;" in other words, (he author attempts to prove, '' that the minor volcanoes on the flanks of Etna may, some of them, be more than 10,000 years old," and quotes with respect the opinion of a distinguished botanist,*' tiiatsome living specimens of the Baobab tree of Africa, and the Taxodium of Mexico, may be 5,000 years old."

f GeoL £ng. and Wales, p. xxxiii.

Cataclysmal Eras. 27

are there other appearances which completely indicate such a change, namely, beds of coal, and the fossil remains of land animals. The carbonisation of roots of trees in clefts of rocks, and of marsh plants in peat- bogs, which takes place, as it were, under our own immediate observation ; the transitions of bituminous wood into pitch-coal, the frequent presence of vegeta- bles pardy converted into coal, in the neighbourhood of beds of coal, and which are more abundant the nearer they are to these beds; and, finally, the chemical nature of coal, which is similar to that of vegetables, go to prove tlie vegetable origin of the older and independent coal formation.

Though some fossil vegetables mht derive their origin, by being floated to quarters more or less remote from their native soil, as we find to be the case in many islands of the South Seas, and on other shores ; on the other hand, neither the breadth and extent of beds of coal, nor the erect position in which fossil trees and reed plants are not unfrequently found in their neighbourhood, coincide with such an explana- tion. The plants from which these beds were formed, once stood and grew in the place where they were buried ; and fi*om these remains we infer that they were entirely land plants, tree-ferns, Lycopodia, and other ciyptogamia. It also appears undeniable, that the land, being once dry, was, during a longer or shorter time, covered with luxuriant vegetation ; that it was afterwards overflowed vrith water, and then became dry land again. But was this overflow of water produced by a sudden, violent, and universal catastrophe, such as we consider the deluge ? Many circumstances leave room for opposite conjecture. If it is probable that the older or black coal is of vego-

28 Geological Theories.

table origin, the plants from which it has originated must haye suffered an incomparably greater change than those of more recent formatioiis. Their compo- sition and their texture, afford evidence of a long operation of the fluid in which the changes were pro- duced ; and their situation proves that the substance of the plants, though not entirely dissolved, was yet much comminuted, and was kept floating and swim- ming, and then precipitated. How can we, in any other way, account for the layers of sand-stone and slate clay, with wfaidi coal regularly alternates, so that from one to sixty alternate beds have been enu- merated ? How can we explain the combination of mineral coal with slate clay, or account for the ap- pearance of bituminous shale, flinty slate, of iron pyrites and iron-ore, in the midst of mineral coal itself ? We do not, however, admit of a repeated uncovering and covering of the land with water, and of a renewal of vegetation for every particular bed of coal ; far from it, for violent inundations exhibit very different phe- nomena. These formations, Uke pure mineral foima- tions, bear the evident impress of a lengthened ope- ration, and of gentle precipitations ; and whoever still entertains doubts regarding this, may have them ccnn- pletely removed by the condition in which vegetable remains are frequently found in the coal formations, by the perfect preservation of the most delicately shaped fern leaves, by the upright position of stems, and by other appearances of a similar character. It is also an important objection against the universality of the covering of water, notwithstanding the wide extent of beds of coal, that they are sometimes accom- panied with fossil remains of fresh water shells, from which we are entitled to draw the conclusion, that

r

Cuvier And Jameson. 29

ihey must have been deposited in enclosed basins of inland waters. From the beds of coal found in various situations among Alpine limestone, as well as in other secondary formations under similar circumstances, we are at liberty to maintain that they are not indebted for their origin to any uniyearsal and sudden revo lution.*

'' When we proceed to the second division of coal formations, to brown coal, or to lignite, the principal diffeience we discover is, that the change which the vegetables have undergone, having taken place at a time when the chemical power had lost much of its energy wsui incomplete ; and besides, we observe in the different farown coal formations, the same repeti* tion of single beds alternating with other beds of rocks, the mixture of different minerals, and not frequently of upright stems. Some appear to be de- rived from sea plants, and others from fresh-water plants ; but the greater proportion from land plants, They, equally with the beds of black coal, give evi- dence of a new overflow of water, and the water plants themselves, which never thrive at a great depth, and which frequently appear under prodigious beds of rodcs, must have experienced such a change. But that change was scarcely of the kind which we un- derstand by a deluge, and the frequent repetition of

Mr. GreenhoQgh, in an address, delivered in 1834, before the Geological Society, of which he was President, avows his concurrence with the theory of Mr. Lyell, first, perhaps, promulgated by Dt. Fleihing in 1825, which as- pmes the impossibility of detecting any iireihigable traces of what is nsnally termed ''Noah's flood/' and to which other geologists attribute so many striking phenomena. The vast mass of evidence which he [Mr. Lyell] had brought together, in illustration of what may be called Dwmal Geology, convinces me, that if, five thousand years ago, a deluge did sweep over the entire globe, its traces can no longer be distinguished from more modem aud local disturbances."

30 Geological Theories.

deluges, indicated, according to some, by the repeated beds of coal from the transition to the newest tertiarj periods, is hardly credible. It may be maintained, with more certainty, of brawn coal than of black coal, that they have been formed in land water, and hence, in limited and isolated basins, since fresh-water ani- mals are their constant attendants."

Thns far the opinions of the Scottish philosopher, whose authority on such a question is entitled to re- spectful consideration. Another writer, however, whose ingenious lucubrations have recently been given to the world in two pleasing volumes, boldly joins issue with the impugners of the common theory, and at once announces that the scriptural cosmogony as literally interpreted, and the phenomena of geology as actually developed, are precisely accordant and synchronical. By the sure guidance of the Sacred Record," says Granville Penn,j- which satisfies every condition that actual observation can demand, we are able to deduce to their true chronological order the various effects or phenomena, which the mineral geo- logy arranges confusedly and anachronically, through neglect of the historical rule ; arbitrarily and fanci- fully creating facts and dates, by gratuitously multi- plying revolutions. For, let us examine, what gene- ral phenomena the mineral formations of the earth present, which may not be philosophically referred to one or other of the four obvious divisions of the Mo- saical geology, creative , fragmentary sedimentary J and diluvial; .which are correspondently adumbrated

CuTier*8 Essay on the Theory of the Earth, p. 425. Appendix by Jameson.

f A Comparative Estimate of the Mineral and Mosaical Geologies. Vol . II. p. 69.

Hosaical Geology. 31

but obscurely, and without any knowledge of causes, in the primitive intermediary secondary y and tertiary of the Mineral geology ; viz. 1. to the fmA formatum or creation of the substance and general fiume-work of the globe : or, 2. to the first revolutian, which formed the basin of the primitive sea : or, to the lony period that succeeded, during which that sea was stationary in its primitive basin : or, 4. and lastly, to the second and last revolutian, in which the sea was transfused into a new basin, leaving the ' wreck and ruin,' of its former basin to constitute our present continents.* To the first of these," continues Mr. Penn '' are plainly to be referred the sensible cha racters and diversities of all primitive finrmatums, re- C(nisable in the vast frame-work of the globe. To the second, are to be referred the universal characters of dislocation and subversion, of downfal and ruin, of fracture and dispersion of iha&e formations ; of subsi- dences, in primordial valleys and plains ; of primitive

FlifloMphen ]ia?e not been leis puzzled in attempts to prodace, to their MUlaAedon, the NoMfaian deluge, than geologlett hare been in their en- dearoun to explain phenomena plainly indicatiTe of dilaYial action. Bur- nety brought the waters from below, through the broken cruH with which he fancied they bad been oorersd daring the Ante-diluTlan period, and with fragments ot this cmst he formed the mountains. Woodward suspended, for a time, all cohegUm among the particles of earth, and reduced the globe to a soft paste; while Whiston, not inferior in fancy to any of his predeoes- soiB, called a comet to his aid. Whateyer may be thought of theories which assume a succession of cataclysms, or of those which, like that detailed in the text, make the most of a single rerolution, certainly the hypothesis ap- parently the most strange, is that which denies that we hare a right to expect to find any traces at all of the deluge of the Scriptures in post-dilu- Tian times ! Yet such was the opinion put forth by Dr. Fleming, in an in- teresting srticle published in the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal for 1826- 26: he contends that " the flood exhibited no Tiolent impetuosity;" hence he adds with this conriction in my mind, I am not prepared to witness m na- iwre any remaining marks of the catastrophe, and," he proceeds, I feel my respect for the authority of revelation heightened, when I see on the present surface no memorials of the OTenU"

32 Geological Theories.

volcamc eruption, fusion and transmutation : all which characters mark the first period of change from the firt perfect condition of the mineral sphere. To tlie third are plainly to be referred, the triturated cha racter of all the fractured parts of those formations ; the sedimentary deposits of their comminuted particles, and the incorporation of the most ancient of these into their fragmentary base; the accumulation of the questionable matter now constituting coal, and occu- pying generally this particular stage in the series of formations ; tiie many volcanoes now extinct, whose yestiges are found on the lower levels of the earth, and in medUerraneous regionSy remote from the sea, and which are therefore extinct, because their former activity resulted from a communication with the waters which have been removed from them : to this long interval are also to be referred, the incredibly numerous assemblages of marine substances in com- pact soils, at levels far above the surface of the present ocean ; the failures of the shattered base, which have rendered inclined, and even vertical, so many of the earliest horizontal depositions ; and, lastly, the subse- quent accumulation of the latest and actual horizontal strata above those. To the fourth and last of these periods are to be referred, with equal evidence, the excavation of valleys of denudation in secondary or dimentary soils, leaving the lateral parts undisturbed ; the transport and aggeration of marine mineral masses ; the moulding of the superior soils on their irregular substrata, displaying the evidence of watery action as plainly, as a stuccoed surface displays evi- dence of the action of an artist's trowel ; the exposure, exsiccation, and induration of those masses now con- stituting the secondary order of mountains, hills, and

cutier's vie IV OF Werner's theory, 33

rocks ; also various peculiarities of form and disposi- tion, caused, from local circumstances, by the mass of waters in the progress of their retreat ; the superficial detritus, and coUuvia of the seaJxmn spread over all these ; and finally, the confused mixture of organic terrestrial froffments, animal and vegetable, previously constituting a part of the furniture of tlie perished earth, which are every where found in soils into which they were precipitated, whilst tliose soils formed the soft and yielding bottom of the retiring sea

Such, in brief, is the theory which, taMng into

account the discoveries of geologists, Mr. Penn, in

his two interesting volumes, expounds in harmony

with the sacred cosmogony. The following passage

in still fewer words, derived from Cuvier, will give a

general idea of the system of Werner, the most

'celebrated among the continental geologists: —

' universal and tranquil ocean deposits, in great masses,

the primitive rocks, — those rocks which are distinctly

A chrystallized, and in which silica is the first predomi*

I natii ingredient. Granite foUns the base on which

all others rest. To granite succeeds gneiss, which is

J'

Ifr. f airitolme, in his work, entitled A GdfienLl View of the Geology of Scripture/' agrees in the main with Mr. Penn. The hais of Mr. Fairholme's theory is, that " all the present dry lands of the earth were formerly the hed of the antediluvian sea ;" and accordingly, that what are now the recep- tacles of coal strata, whether composed of sandstone or calcareons matter, have originally formed ralleys or basins in the bed of the antediluvian sea, having received their contents while that sea was depositing the whole moveable matter of former continents, with which its waters must have been charged. In these deposits, large trees are sometimes found " detached from the great strata of coal, and extending from one stratum through a variety of others, which is sofficient proof," says Mr. Fairholme, of these strata, at least, having all been formed at one period* In the assumed diluvial origin of onr coal basins, it is contended that the great chalk formation formed at least one portion of the bed of the sea at the destructive period, and yet in the usually received opinions of geology, the chalk is placed far above the coal.

D

S4 Geological Theories.

only a graaite beguifiing to be slaty. By degrees mica predominates. Slates of different kinds appear; ' but in proportion as the purity of the precipitation is chained, the distinctness of the chrystalline gzain is diminished. Serpentines, porphyries, and traps suc- ceed, in which this grain is still less distinct, although the siliceous nature of these rocks evinces the re- turning purity ot the deposition. Intestine agitations in the fluid destroy a part of these primary deposites : new rocks are formed from their debris united by a cement. It is amidst these convulsions that living I nature arises. Carbon, the first of these products, ' begins to shew itself. Coal, a mineral formed Jrom I vegeUMes, appears in vast quantities. Lime, which had abready been associated with the primitive rocks, becomes more and mare abundant. Rich collections of sea-salt, to be one day explored by man, fill im. mense cavities. The watep, again tranquillized, but having their contents changed, dosit beds less thick, and of greater variety, in which the remains of Uomg bodies are successively accumtdated, in an order not less fixed than that of the rocks which contain them* Finally, the last retreat of the waters diffuses over the land immense collections of alluvial matters, the first seats of vegetation, of cultivation, and of social life. The rents in the strata formed during these convxdsions become filled with the rocks of various kinds, as granite, trap, &c., thus forming vHns or dykes. The metals, like the rocks, have had their epochs and their successions. The last of the iffimi- tive, and the first of the secondary rocks, have receired them iu abundance. They become rare in countries of later formation. Commonly they are found in particular situations, in those veins which seem to he

TABULAR SERIES OF STRATA. 3ft

rents produced in the great rocky masses, and which have been JiUed after their formation. But ihey are not all of equal age. Those which have heen last fonned are easfly known, because their reins intersect those of the more ancient, and are not themselves intersected. Tin is the oldest of them all ; silver and copper are the latest formed. Gold and iron, those two masters of the world, seem to have been deposited m the bowels of the earth, at all the diflferent epochs of its formation; but iron appears at each epoch under ifierent fcMnois, and we can assign the age of its dif- ferent ores.

It can scarcely be necessary to remind the least attentive reader, any more than the most superfidal observer, that the masses composing the crust of the earth are by no means found in regular concentric depositions, stratum-super-stratum, like the coats of an omxm : on the contrary, they are found, as we shall afterwards more particularly notice, singularly dislo- eated and intermixed ; llie beds placed at every angle with the horizon, from a parallel to a vertical position : the lowest, or most ancient deposites being in some instances elevated above the newest alluvial soil, as in the case of Dartmoor, in Devonshire ; many parts of ComwaH ; the well-known granitic mass of Mount Sorrd, in Leicestershire; and the Grampians of

The followmg tabular series, proposed by Cony- beare and I%illips, as divided into five comprehensive classes, will exhibit at one view the general succession of strata, and the principle of the Wemerian arrange- ment: llie names in the second cdumn are proposed by these gentlemen : —

D 2

Geological Theories.

Ouiraeier.

Modem Names,

frtTtMTUM

Namee,

Former Name*.

1 . Formations (chiefly of sand and clay) above the chalk.

Superior Order.

Newest Flostz Class.

Tertiary Class.

2. Comprising —

a. Chalk.

b. Sands and clays beneath

the chalk.

e. Calcareous freestones (oolites) and argillaoe- ous beds.

d. New red sandstone, con- glomerate and magne- sian limestone.

Supermedial Order.

Floetz Class.

SfMondaiy Clasa.

3. Carboniferoas Rocks, com- prising—

a. Coal measures.

b, Carboniferoas limestone. e. Old red sandstone.

Medial Order.

Sometimet refermi to the prece- ding—aometimea to the aiicceed- inc cIsM, by writers of tbew schooU; yery often the coal mesBaret are referred to the foiw mer — the subjacent limestone and sandstone to Uie latter.

4. Roofing slate, &e. &c.

Submedial OwJer.

Transition Class.

Intermediate' Class.

6. Mica slate. Gneiss. Granite, &c.

InferiorOrder.

Primitive Class.

Primitiye Clan.

In all these formations from the lowest to the highest we find a repetition of rocks and beds of similar chemical composition i. e, siliceous, argillaceous, and calcareous, but with considerable difference in tex- ture J those in the lowest formations being compact and often crystalline, while those ia the highest and most recent are loose and earthy. Although the five comprehensire classes foregoing, will serve to exhibit a general view of the great ouflines of Modem Geo- logy, we no sooner begin to trace in detail the suc- cession of mineral beds, than their numbers and vari- ety appear to be endless, and but for some classifica- tion would be infinitely perplexing to the student. But by grouping together individual strata in a natu- ral and easy manner, we reduce them to a limited number of series, each series comprehending nume-

r

Repetitions Of Strata. 37

T011S individual strata natmally allied and associated together. To explain this by an example : if Der- byshire be the conntty under examination, the inves- tigator will find a series of twenty or more alternations of beds of coal, sandstone, and slaty clay, repeated over and oyer; and beneath these beds a like alter- nation of limestone strata, with beds of the rock called toadstone. Here, then, all the individual beds at once resolve themselves into two comprehensive se- ries— the upper containing coal, the lower limestone ; each series being characterised by the repetition of its own peculiar members : such series are called Form ations. In some parts of the great northern coal- field, the workable seams, which as to the mass of tliem are spoken of as above the encrinal limestone, are sometimes interstratified therewith : at the same time, in certain oilier situations, the regular coal measures extend, as we shall afterwards find, under the magnesian limestone: where this is the case, some of the seams appear to have suffered deteriora- tion. Extensive collieries, however, are established upon, and shafts sunk through the limestone, in places where it is fifty yards in thickness. The mining district of Alston Moor, &c., westward from Newcas- tle, consists of an immense floor of limestone, rich in veins of lead ore, and masses of which have occasion- ally been cut through in sinking the coalpits. It may be briefly added in this place, that the fossil substances more particularly alluded to in the present volume, as being more or less available for the pur- poses of ftiel, may be enumerated in the descending

Rev. W. D. Conybeare. Introdnct. Geology of England and Wales. Fait I.y p. V.

/

38 Geological Theories.

order of the series as foUow : — 1. peat ; 2. lignites ; 3. bituminous coal ; 4. anthracite. To each of these substances — or rather suits of substances, for each comprehends numerous varieties — modern science, as aheady intimated, attributes a vegetable origin ; unless, indeed, we except the last — in nrhich case, as we shall find, the exception will have to encounter strong evidence against its admission. The latter three bituminous fuels above named, sean to bear a striking relation in the gradual change wlttch, in each case, the ligneous structure has undergcme, to the geological newness or antiquity of the strata amidst which thej commonly occur. The carboniferous group — or true coal measures, in which the vegetable origin of the beds, however undoubted, is by no means obvious, are comprehended, according to the prece* ding scale, in the medial order ; above whidi, we have the lignites, where woody structure is very apparent, and sometimes but little changed ; while below, even in the primary rocks themselves, we find anthracite, in which every trace of organic structure is commonly obliterated. Nearly all the rocks lying above those termed primtivmU properly. piiLy-,utaiB animal remains : the generally striking character and occasional profusion of these, give to the fossiUferous strata a pecuUar interest, not only in the eyes of a student in natural philosophy, but to the casual ob- server : ihey are likewise of vast importance in aiding

Piofessor Jameson comiderecL what he calls glance coal and black coal," to be original cbemicol depodU, " as little connected with vegetable remains, as the sbells that occur in limestone are with that rock." His rea- sons were, that these coals occur in primitlye rocks as gneiss, mica slate, clay slate, &c, and appear to be contemporaneous formations. More recent and extended investigation, however, does not seem to lend confirmation to such an opinion.

F088Ilifer0Us Strata. 39

US in the identification of remote fonnations. The beautiful principle that eveiy distinct geological de- posit had its appropriate suite of fossils, was first pro- mulgated by Mr. W. Smith, who may justly be styled the Father of Modem Geology. The formation of the Geological Society in 1807, the object of which was rather to collect and publish facts than to pro- pound or support theories, has been vastly contribu- tiye to the difiiision of an interest in this study through the most intelligent classes of the commu- nity.

Chapter Iii.

Peat.

Early use of Peat for Fuel — Its abundance in various countries — Hypothesis of the discovery of its in- flammahU nature — Notices of the knowledge and application of Peat in ancient times — Theories of the origin of Turf deposits — Various opinions and testimonials concerning the bituminization of Vege- table Matter — Plants which chiefly enter into the composition of Peat bogs — Irish and Scotch bog mosses — Extraneous remains found in Peat bogs — Analogy between the depositions of some stratified turbaries and the Coal formation — Method of dig- ging and preparing Peat in Ireland — Varieties of Peat — Old practice of charring Turf — Popular prejudices in favour of Peat Fuel.

X HE most conunon article of domestic firing iu the less wooded districts of this country, previously to the general use of pit coal, was turf or peat, a species of fuel still dug and burnt in large quantities in those places where it abounds, and where wood or coal are scarce or unattainable. It would be difficult to say at what period the material now under consi- deration was first applied to its long-acknowledged

Importance Of Peat. 41

useful purpose : that it was used, as it is at present, fipom a very early period of our history, there can be no doubt : and, in the absence of ligneous and mi- neral fuels especially, its great abundance, easy ob- tainment, and singular production, arrest attention to one of those sources of comfort and convenience, which an infinitely wise Providence has opened in the store-house of Nature for the benefit of mankind. Peat claims some notice in a work like this, not only because that, in common with wood, it was an early, and still continues to be an article of extensive domes- tic consuntion as fuel ; but also, and more especially, because that, like coal, it may be regarded in some sort as a fossil, being dug out of the earth : it has even , been considered, erroneously perhaps, to exhibit the progress of transformation from the living vegetable fibre to the compact lignite or jet : indeed, Mr. Wil- liams, a respectable mineralogical writer, supposed ; that antediluvian peat bogs have been sources of , fossil coal; an opinion which has not wanted the countenance of much higher authority.

It has been supposed that the discovery that vari- ous kinds of earth, or peat, might be used as fuel, would originate in accident in some place destitute of wood ; as, not only may the heat of the sun, after long drought, occasion combustion,* but a spark, faUing fortuitously on a turf moor, during a diy summer, often sets it on fire, and the conflagration it occasions generally lasts so long, that it cannot es- cape notice. Tacitus mentions a notable instance of

Instances of this are not wanting in oar day. The heat was so great during the aatamn of 1833, that the ground in some places spontaneously took fire, especially in Switzerland : and in the summer of the present year (1834), a moor took fire owing to the long-conUnucd drought, in Lironia.

42 Peat.

this kind, which occurred in the neighbourhood of Cologne, not long after the foundation of that city. In Siberia, about the middle of the eighteenth cen- tuiy, a village, on accaunt of ite inanby dtaation, was removed to another place, and the remains, that they might be the more easily carried away, were set on fire. The flames having communicated to the soil, which was inflammable, occasioned great de- vastation ; and when GmeUn was there, it had bei burning for half a year.

It seems, however, scarcely necessary to have re- course to such an hypothesis for suggesting the use of peat as an economi< fud ; the presence and appear- ance of the substance itself, must at once have led to its application as a fuel by those who had previously witnessed vegetable matter of any Idnd in a state of combustion. Certainty, its value for this purpose was very early understood in Germany ; for Pliny says expressly, that the Chauci pressed together with their hands a kind of mossy earth, which they dried by the wind rather than by the sun, and which they used not only for cooking their victuals, but also for wanmng their bodies. The earliest certain account of turf in the middle ages, which Beckmann had met with, was a letter of sanction, by which an Abbot Ludolph, in the year 1113, permitted a nunnery near Utrecht to dig cepUes for its own use, m a part of his vena. Now, there can be no doubt that vena signifies a turf-bog, and cespHe turf On the same authority, we are told that the words furfta, iwrhoj turlkB ad focum, tur/a, occur for turf in the years 1190, 1191, 1301, and 1210. The traffic in this kind

Bockmann's Hist. Inventions. I. 335. f HUt Nat. Lib. XVI. c. 1.

Notices Of Ancibmt Turbaries. 43

of fuel is recognised in the Leges Burgwwm of Scot- land, so eaify as about 1 140. T\$rbaria, for a tmf- moor, is found in Matthew Paris, wlio died in 1369 ; tmrbagimny in a dijdoma of Philip the Fair, in the year 1308, signifies the right of digging torf, as turbare does to dig up turf. Brito, who lived about 1223, is quoted as describing the productions of flanders, as including arida gMnifoco siccus meisa marescis, the latter words of which are understood to signify turf- bc. It may be added that turbatyy orsome cognate word, frequently occurs in the earlier foundation charters of the monasteries in this country, as con- veying the right to dig turf generally within a certain limited extent of ground*

The natural history of peat has puzzled enquirers a good deal; and explanations of its origin, hardly less discordant than those recorded on the subject of fossil coal, have been entertained and defended. For in- tance, it was supposed by one author, to have had an origin coeval with the hills or the valleys in which it is formed; — by another, to have been a bituminous depofiite of the sea ; — by a third, the wreck of once floating islands ; — and by Pliny and others, to have had an entirely mineral origin. The fact that theories like these should have been taken up by modem writers, is the more remarkable, when it is recollected that peat-bogs, or mosses, not only lie so immediately commodious for inspection, as that their growth and tremsformation may be said to take place before our eyes; but, from the various animal and vegetable remains, and even wcrks d art, which have been occasionally discovered embedded therein, their recent fonnation, as compared with the coal strata, is ren-

Peat.

Plott. entertained the opxn ucdox,

not a congenes of deadP'T LneraUy supposed,

nystical iffl-J-*'.tS Slhest degree of per- but actually alive, and in . its analy- every circumstance m ihej substance,

tends to point it out as vegetables, pax- possessing certainjpwperties of frix

Lularly that of tfite,Af indeed very

of putrid vegetable matters than a

stance.t . . to the notion of

deriving our peat-bogs from tg ..pid peat." increment of a P-lltTsupposed moss-

plant, we should not expecx w i*"

a much longer period than humi Ufe. r° haTO heen flUed mth tinent of Europe, that cTittea of h.ve IMmed it in the short space of thirty years. And pe m , aw not

oertain faUen foreste In Scothmd, Jins, haTe heen foond buried seTen feet under mosses in this country : ° ' beneath Chat

the paUngs of a paA, described by .'""tTfa.fl CuOock, Mom, in Laacaahit*.— Vi<fe an eJoWote orticl. Sf in Edin. PhU. JfrnmoL 1820. eoJ. p. 40.

t In Holland, submarine peat is derived from fuci; and on paita or ou own coast from Zosiera mmina, — Lyell,

Origin Op Peat-Boos. 45

founds almost entirely composed of other species of Tegetable matter. Indeed, that which is here sup- posed to have originated in one particular mode of vegetation, appears to depend on a certain change which affects vegetable matter in general ; but per- haps some parts of the vegetable creation more than others. Thus the confervnB and the mosses, and par- licularlj the sphagnum palustre, appear to be vegeta* bles which are peculiarly calculated to suffer a con version into this kind of substance. The promptitude with which the species of plants just enumerated appear to submit to their change, and their disposi- tion extensively to spread themselves, through every interstice of such peat-bogs as they have possessed themselves of, may perhaps account, in a great mea- sure, for that augmentation of peat mosses, which the Doctor [Anderson] says can have happened in no other way than by its increase in the manner of growing vegetables from the time of its first genera- tion to the present hour.*'

To prove that this augmentation is not of grarving peaty but of vegetable matters under the influence of the common laws of vegetation, and at the same time to point out more clearly what appeared to be the actual circumstance which seemed to corroborate Dr. Anderson's opinion, Mr. Parkinson adduces an ac- count of the process as delivered by an eye-witness. Dr. King, in a paper presented many years ago to the Dublin Society, says, that " Ireland doth abound in moss more than, I believe, any kingdom, insomuch that it is very troublesome, being apt to spoil fruit trees and quicksets. — This moss is of divers kinds :

Organic Remains toI. i. p. 309.

40 Peat.

that wliicli grows in bogs is renukahle ; your liglit spongy gronnd is noUiiiig but a congee ibe tiireads of this moss, before it is sofficientlj rotten, (end then the tnrf looks white, and is light). I hare seen it in soch qnantitieB, and so tong, that the torf spades would not cat it : in tiie north of Ireluid, they, bj way of joke, call it old mfe's tow, and cnrse her that buried it, when it hinders tiiem in cutting the torf: it is not mach unlike flax; the turf holes in time grow up with it again, and all the little gutters in bogs are generally filled with it" The prooese by which the Kubstance of peat is fonned from these Tegetables, Paitinson considers as a bitmninous fermentation peculiar to vegetable matter placed in ' dtnations, as not only

esclnde the external air, and secore &e presence of mois- ture, but prevent the escape of the more volatile prindples, and whidi terminates in the formation of those sabstances termed bituminous."

It is now well known that turf, in general, consists of a congeries of the roots and fibres of about forty diflfer- ent species of plfmts, chiefly mosses, amongst idiich the Sphaum Pahstre of lin- nseus, (S. Laiifolivm. Eng. Bot.) represented in the mar- gin (Jig. 1 .), laily predconi- nates. In addition to heath and fern usually growing on

Composition Of Peat. 47

tuif moors, we commoiily meet with the mfriea j/ak or Dutch myrde, and one or more species of cotton grass (Eriopkarum), witli its beantiful white tnft.

Mr. Hmiter, speaking of tiie tmf moras on Hat. field Chace, ccmprmng tfaonsands of acres, firam whice a great part of Ycwkshire was finr ages plied with fuel, observes, that when the torf is re* moved, a natural mould is disoovered, like that of the surrounding country ; and a natiye of these regions, who had often watched the bhoureis on the moors, ayers that he has seen Uie land beneath the torf lyii in rig and farrow ; as if, before the turf collected Txpaa it, it had been submitted to the higher oper%* tions of husbandry.''*

In some parts of Aberdeenshire, Dr. Anderson in- fcums us, there is found a certain kind of peatnoas, which when formed into peats in the commoai way, the latter are found to be more tender and brittle than usual, so as to break down during the process of drying, into irregular lumps called clods. When one of these clods is thrown into the fire, it soon kindles, and bums with a clear bngt flame, much resem* Uii that which would be produced by alump of tal- low or butter in the same drcumstances : these are therefore called creeshf i. e. greamf clods, though they discover no degree of unctnosity to the sight, smell, or feel. These lunqw, which are not common, are used as we use chips of wood, for kindling orreviTing the fire. Professor Jameson states, that in some of the peat mosses in Scotland, the curious substance called mineral tallow has been found; andasitisnow known to chemists that the muscular parts of animals

South Ywkflliire, roL L p. M4.

48 Peat.

after having been buried some time where water could have access to them, are changed into a fatty sub- stance resembling spermaceti and called adipocire, it has been conjectured that the unctuosity of tliis peat and the mineral tallow are indebted for their exist- ence to animals that have been buried in the bogs ' in which situations indeed the more solid proofs of such occurrences are often found. Besides, it is now well known that many of these vast mosses occupy the sites of forests that have perished within the historic period — the causes which have led to this destruction are various : but in many places, besides the record or tradition of the fact, not only are prostrate trees but upright rooted stems found abundantly embedded in the accumulated vegetable matter of the bog. Some of the largest trees known in this country, and well adapted for the masts and keels of vessels have been discovered in such situations. Mr. Hunter informs us that in the bogs about Hatfield, " firs have been found thirty yards in length, and oaks twenty-five and thirty-five yards : trees of other species are found, as the ash, birch, yew, and willow ; but the fir is the most abundant : large quantities of fir cones and hazel nuts are discovered."

One of the most interesting facts in the his- tory of peat, is its containing powerful antiseptic properties, by which animal substances are preserved entire for a great number of years. Many such in- stances are on record. In June 1747, the body of a woman was found six feet deep in a peat-moor in the Isle of Axhohn, in Lincolnshire, lite antique san- dals on her feet afforded evidence of her having been buried there for many ages ; yet her nails, hair, and skin are described as having shown hardly any marks

Bodies Preserved In Peat. 49

of decay. A pair of sandals taken from tlie feet of a body so found in the time of Elizabeth, were long hung up in one of the churches in this country, as having belonged to an antediluvian. The vast antlers, and even the entire skeleton, of the gigantic elk (cer- vus elephaSy) now extinct, sometimes occur in the Irish bogs ; as do also the remains of man. In a turbary on the estate of the Earl of Moira, in Ireland, a hu- man body was dug up, a foot deep in gravel, covered with eleven feet of moss ; the body was completely clothed, and the garments seemed all to be made of hair. Before the use of wood was known in that country, the clothing of the inhabitants was made of hair, so that it would appear that this body had been buried in that early period ; yet it was fresh and un* impaired. In the Philosophical Transactions we find an example recorded of the bodies of two persons having been buried in moist peat, in Derbyshire, in 1674, about a yard deep, which were examined twenty-eight years and nine months afterwards ; ''the colour of their skin was fair and natural, their flesh soft as that of persons newly dead/'

If we could regard, as some Imve done, peat, jet, and coal as different stages of the same transmutation of organized matter, the present chapter would be en- titled to its place in tbis volume, not only because it treats of the most obvious and andent species of ex- humated fuel, but also as exhibiting the actual com- mencement of the coal series. Mr. Conybeare, speaking of peat as an alluvial deposite, and as be- longing to an order of causes still in action, thus de- scribes the changes which he imagines it may un- dergo : '' the upper parts of its mass present the fibres

E

60 Peat,

of the vegetables whence it originates and which still cover its surface (principally sphagnum palustre) in an almost unchanged state ; in the middle part the texture is gradually obliterated and the mass passes into a compact peat ; in the lowest portion this change is carried still fiirther and substances very analagous to jet are found : in some instances beds of peat al- ternate with beds of mud or sand or even shells and marle deposited in lakes ; or of silt and sand formed in the aestuaries of rivers ; in these cases they appear exactly to represent an imperfect and unmatured coal- formation/'* This analogy to the proper carboni- ferous strata, is still more strikingly exemplified by the well-known fact that some of these mosses con- tain metallic oxides in considerable quantity : bog iron-ore is not unknown to the smelter. It occurs in large rusty-looking masses, being deposited by the flowing of chalybeate water highly impregnated. Copper is likewise found in a similar state, particu- larly in the county of Cork, where the particles are so abundant that, in the year 1812, from a cupriferous peat-bog, on the east side of Glendore harbour, forty or fifty tons of the dried peat produced, when burnt, one ton of ashes, containing from ten to fifteen per cent of copper. But to advert for a moment to the passage above cited : — notwithstanding the assertion — not disputed as to the fact, that substances ana- lagous to jet are found" in the peat, and some allu- sion to the eeriments of Dr. Mac CuUoch, intended to shew that the agency of fire applied to beds of lig- nite and peat, may convert, not wood, but vegetable matter previously bituminized into coal, it does not

Geology, &c. Part I. p. 328.

Stratified And Metalliferous Peat. 51

appear that Mr. Conybeare is fairly obnoxious to the following strong censnre of a Continental writer quoted by Mr. Granville Penn :— '' I shall not stop to examine the different opinions that have been pro- pounded on the origin of coal : I shall only notice one, which is not without a specious appearance. It is by some supposed that the three great fossil com- bustibles, coal, lignites, and peat, pass from one into the other by an effect of successive elaboration, which is continually proceeding ; so that, in the course of elaboration, our pettt-beds would become coaUbeds. This idea could only enter the mind of one who is ignorant that nature has fixed in the foimation of these substances a line of denoaikation which sepa rates them irrevocably." Mr. Penn, after quoting the foregoing passage, inquires, with reference to a theory presently to be noticed, whether lignites — bi- tuminised fossil wood — may not have resulted from terrestrial vegetation, forests of the perished earth floated and sunk, during the great diluvial catastrophe, within those marine soils whose native vegetation is now transformed into coal ? To this, it might be said in reply, that if all other conditions were found con- curring in favour of the notion that our beds of bitu- minous coal have been deposited by the subsidence of vegetable matter floated from an immense distance by means of some diluvial catastrophe, there exist modem phenomena by no means unfavourable to such an hypothesis. At all events, vast depositions of lig- nite are constantly taldng place from this cause in some northern latitudes. We are told, on good au- thority that tropical plants are taken up by the great

D'AttbiiiBBOii, torn. U. p. 301.' £ 2

62 Peat.

current flowing out of the Gulf of Mexico, and car- ried in a northerly direction, till they reach the shores of Iceland and Spitzbergen uninjured, except in having commonly suflFered complete decortication. / " The banks of the Mackenzie river display," says / Mr. Lyell,* " almost every where, horizontal beds of wood coal, alternating with bituminous clay, gravel, sand, and friable sandstone ; sections, in short, of such deposits as are now evidently forming at the bottom of the lakes which it traverses. Notwithstanding the vast forests intercepted by the lakes, a still greater mass of drift wood is found where the Mackenzie reaches the sea, in a latitude where no wood grows at present, except a few stunted willows* At the mouths of the river, the alluvial water has formed a barrier of islands and shoals, where we may expect a great / formation of coal at some distant period."

But to return to peat — it has seldom, if ever been discovered within the tropics, and it rarely occurs in the valleys even in the south of France or Spain. It abounds more and more in proportion as we advance farther from the equator, and becomes not only more frequent but more inflammable in northern latitudes.f The use of peat as an economical fuel, is, as already mentioned, very general in those parts of the United Kingdom where it abounds — but more particularly in Scotland and Ireland, — one-tenth of the latter being reckoned to be covered with bog matter. Where it exists plentifully in England, it is sometimes burnt, either in admixture with coal itself, or as a cheaper substitute ; and so far is it from being altogether ex- eluded in those counties most noted for coal, that even

Geology, ii. 349. f Rev. Dr. Rexmie on Peat, p. 260.

Digging And Drying Peat. 53

in Northumberland as well as Yorkshire considerable quantities of peat firing are expended.

It is scarcely possible to pass — in the Summer season especially, through those parts of Ireland which are remote firom the capital and the larger towns, without witnessing somewhere or other, the operations of the turf-diggers. The turf-spade, in shape is not unlike that used by gardeners in general; but is lighter and narrower. With this implement, the workman first cuts away, in a sort of large cubical sods, the superior turfy stratum of the bog : as this is comparatively loose and light, it is presentiy dried and ready for use. On digging lower, the substance of the peat becomes more moist and compact, and appears more like rotten wood than the roots of moss ; it has, however, a sufficient degree of fibrous con- nexion to admit of its being readily raised in masses somewhat resembling large bricks. These quadran- gular clods, which the digger cuts out and throws up with great dexteri, are heaped in small stacks to dry ; after which, they are either used on the spot, or carted away by purchasers, according to circumstances — to preserve them through the Winter, the piles are sometimes thatched. On sinking still lower in the bog, the matter becomes less solid, loses its coherency, and assumes the consistency of black sludge ; this is laded out with a scoop, similar to that used by brick- makers for wetting their clay, and is thrown upon a smooth floor or bottom, where, from exposure to the air, it stifiens and consolidates; it is then cut and cross-cut with the spade into cubic masses which, on becoming dry, are found to bum with great freedom, in consequence of the bituminous saturation, to which the matter of them seems to have been subjected.

64 lEAT.

The accumulations of peat differ considerably in area depth, and quality. On the banks of the Shan- non, one of the moss tracts is stated to be about fifty miles in length, by two or three miles in breadth. In mountainous situations the depth of the bed is seldom above three feet — rarely so much : in bogs and low grounds, into which alluyial peat is " drifted," it is sometimes found forty feet thick — though ftdly one-half of tliis volume is water.* The quality of peat varies according to the different situations where it is formed ; as those places differ in drainage ; in the nature of the vegetables they produce ; and in the kind and quantity of alluvium deposited among the dead vege- table matter. The conditions of purity, compactness and weight, axe required in those kinds which have been sometimes estimated as equal to inferior coals. Dr. MacCullochf considers peat as presenting five obvious varieties, depending upon situation, viz., — mountain peat, marsh peat, lake peat, forest peat, and marine peat : he likewise gives lists of such bog and other plants as he conceives enter most largely into the composition of each kind. As a fiiel, however, Mr. Tredgold| appears to consider it sufficient to di- vide peat into two kinds only — the first, that which is compact and heavy, of a brownish black colour, and with scarcely any vestiges of its vegetable origin

Inundations of fluid peat haye occasionally taken place to a considera- ble extent In most of the instances recorded, the bogs hare become so saturated with moisture, that, lying aslope above some subjacent level, they bare slid or flowed down. A notable instance of this sort was the irruption of a part of the Solway Moss, wbich at the time [1772] consisted of 1300 acres very deep and tender: a part of this mass, on being deluged with rain, flowed firom iu ancient bed, and covered 300 acres of the adjoining land, to a depth of 30 feet — PhiL Trans, vol xiil, p. 305. Abridgment.

t Edin. Phil. Journal. Vol. ii. p. 40.

i Tiedgold on Warm, and Vent Buildings, p. 44.

Varieties, And Charring. 55

remaining ; this is the best kind : — the second is light and spongy, of a brown colour, and seems to be a mass of dead plants and roots which have under- gone little change ; it inflames readily and is quickly consumed. It must be remarked, however, that so highly imflaimnable are some even of the denser kinds, that the characteristic distinctions of bituminised wood are considered insufficient to explain the cir- cilinstance — and hence, the Ince peat of Lancashire is beUeved to be penetrated by petroleum derived from some bitaminous spring. According to the authority above named, the weight of a cubic foot of peat, varies firom 44lbs. to TOlbs.; ihe denser variety affording about 40 per cent, of charcoal. Sir H. Davy has stated that in general, one hundred parts of dry peat contain from 60 to 99 parts of matter destructible by fire, and the residuum consists of earths, usually of the same kinds as the substratum, as clay, marl, lime, &c.

The practice of charring turf obtained at an early period, especially in Germany where it was much fised : it is said to have been employed in this state at the Freyberg smelting houses about the year 1560, though the undertaking, Beckmaim assures us, was not attended with success. In some parts of Bohe- mia, Silesia, Upper Saxony and other places, as we leam from the same authority, it is common to subject the turf used in working metals, to a certain degree of combustion in kilns or furnaces ; after undergoing this process, it is considered that it kindles sooner, bums with less air, and forms a more moderate and uniform fire. Attempts to substitute peat treated as above, for charcoal in some of the smelting establish- ments of this country, were not unknown during the earlier part of the seventeenth century. And at this

66 Peat.

day, a description of peat called in some parts of De- vonshire " Blackwood," is, when cut, dried and char- red, used by the smiths in tempering edge-tools. " Turf," says an Irish writer. Dr. King,* " is ac- counted a tolerably sweet fire ; and having very im- politically destroyed our wood, and not as yet found stone coal, except in a few places, we could hardly live without some bogs ; when the turf is charred, it serves to work iron, and even to make it in a bloom- ery or ironwork j turf charred, I reckon the sweetest and wholesomest fire that can be ; fitter for a cham- ber, and for consumptive people, than either wood, stone coal, or charcoal." Notwithstanding this truly Irish eulogy of the national bog fuel, one of the strongest objections to the use of peat for domestic fires is the sagreeable odour it emits while burning. But in this, as in many other instances, we are re- minded of the adage de gustihus nil disputandum ; for Mr. Loudon, in his interesting EncyclopsBdia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture, mentions that, in most parts of the Highlands of Scotland, peat fuel is so abundant, and the people so attached to peat smoke, that when new houses, built with stone and lime, with chimneys to carry off the smoke, were introduced on the Marquis of Stafford's estates, many of the farmers refused to live in them j and it took years, before others could be reconciled to the clean and cold appearance which they alleged was produced by the want of smoke.

Phil. Trans. Vol. xt. Abridgment 1686.

Chapter Iv.

Natural History Of Coal.

Nature and origin of Coal — Different opinions which have been entertained on that subject — Hypothetical queries answered — Inferences and illustrations of the vegetable origin of Coal — Chemical investigations of Mr. Hatchett — Three conditions of Fossil Fuel; submerged forestSy lignites or bituminized wood, and true Coal — Description of the Bovey Coal forma- tion— Supposed state of the atmosphere at the period when the Coal VegetcMes flourished — Remarks on the prodigious supply of materials — Forests and drift wood — Have the vegetable mcMers forming the Coal strata been floated from a distance, or did they originally grow in situations near to those places where, in their changed condition, they are now found? — Causes which may have operated in effect-* ing the bituminization of the Coal plants — Opinions of Mr. Penn and others — Supposed peaty origin of Coal—Anthracite.

Of the formations or suites of strata already briefly described towards the close of Chapter IL that con- taming the carbonaceous deposits is the most inter- esting : its age and composition involve problems

Natural History Of Coal.

which engage the researches and excite die specula- tions, not of the mineral geologist only, hut also of persons addicted to the study of pure mineralogy and chemistry. Numerous treatises have at different times been devoted directly or incidentally to disqui- sitions upon the nature and origin of coal ; and, sb might he expected, the most conflicting and even contradictory conclusions have been come to on the subject. Mr. Hatchett,* enumerates as follows, the different opinions which have been propounded with respect to the origin of this substance — of these, Mr. Penn says, " the first three are chemical and scientific; the fourth is altogether speculative and imaginary, and pertains exclusively to the mineral geology":— I. That pit-coal is an earth or stone chiefly of the argillaceous genus, penetrated and impregnated with bitumen. But Mr. Kirwan long ago, very justly remarked, that the insufficiency of this solution is de- monstrated by Kilkenny and other coals, which are devoid of bitumen, and also that the quantity of earthy or stony matter in the most bituminous coals bears no proportion to them.

II. The most prevailing opinion is, that nuneral coal is of vegetable origin : that the vegetable bodies have, subsequently to their being buried under vast strata of earth, been mineralized by some unknown process, of which sulphuric acid has probably been the principal agent, and that by means of this add, the oils of the different species of wood have been converted into bitumen, and a coaly substance has been formed.

III. The opinion of Arduino is most singular : he

Philosophical Transactions, 1806.

/

j:

Various Opinions And Queries. 59

conceiyes coal to be entirely of marine formation and to have originated from the fat and nnctuous matter of the numerous tribes of animals that once inhabited the ocean.

IV. Mr. Kirwan considered coal and Utumen to have been derived from what he designates, 'the primordial chaotic fluid."

Could we imagine a person, acquainted with the methods of modem physical investigation, to hear the enquiry relative to the vegetable origin of our coal fields started for the first time, it may be supposed he would naturally think of propounding a series of questions something like the foUowing :—

1. Is coal, when subjected to chemical analysis, fiund to yield products analagous to those derived by similar processes from ligneous matters ?

2. Have any experiments been instituted by which the conversion of wood into matter resembling coal has been effected ?

3. Do there any where exist in situ, masses of matter exhibiting on a large scale, the actual stages or progress of such a transmutation as that assumed by geologists — i. e. depositions presenting the dis- tinct transition characteristics, comprehending un- doubted woody fibre in the superior, or upper or newer beds, and of true mineral coal in the inferior or lower, or more ancient strata ?

4. Do the coal strata present any oiganic remains / or other phenomena indicative of vegetable origin ?

To every one of these queries a distinct answer in the affirmative might be given; nevertheless, the enquiry developes collaterally so many anomalous phenomena, that the application of facts tending to establish a conclusion at which Mr. Hatchett, and

60 Natural History Of Coal.

recent geological writers in general have arrived; namely — that the theory wliich regards vegetable substances as the principal origin of coal, much the most probable, because it is corroborated by the greater number of geological facts, as well as by many experimental results, — has by no means been unincumbered with difficulties. It has, indeed, been justly remarked, that until lately the vegetable origin of c(Md has, in the more perfectly fossilised varieties, been rather inferred than demonstrated. Peat, we know, from actual observation, to consist of decayed vegetables. The process is going on under our eyes : we can watch its progress, distinguish its degrees, and observe its results. The lignites of the upper depo- sits are so analagous to peat, and so decidedly present traces of woody tissue, that we can have no reasonable doubts respecting their origin. Bovey coal is evi-/ dently dicotyledonous wood partially altered. In the coal beds of the lower formations, however, we cease to recognise decided appearances of vegetable matter, and in several varieties the texture is so compact or crystalline, that were analogy inapplicable, they could not be considered as organic. This is more especially the case with glance coal, as also with the variety called pitch coal. The foregoing are the sentiments of Mr. Witham, who, in his work on Fossil Vegeta- bles, has delineated beautiful sections of jet, lignites, and even the cannel coal of Lancashire, in all of which the traces of organization are decided — though some of these, as the Bovey coal for instance, where the woody character is strikingly obvious exteriorly, and in the grain viewed generally, did not present those interesting appearances under the microscope, which might have been expected.

hatchett's investigations. 61

Chemical investigation, already adverted to, al- though pursued by several able experimentalists, and in its results developing much curious illustration, has perhaps been the least conclusive in its bearings upon Uie question of the ligneous origin of mineral coal. Mr. Hatchett, however, not only obtained from coal a sabstance possessing properties analagous to those be* longing to that extractive principle of several vegeta bles, especially oak bark, called tannin, — but likewise resin, a product which has always been attributed to organized bodies, particularly to those of the vegetable kingdom ; and which does not appear to have been obtained from coal previously to the experiments of the above-named individual. Mr. Hatchett, in his various experiments, found it easy to produce, by means of chemical action upon vegetable substances, a matter analagous to Bovey coal, with the important exception that the artificial product was never bitu<- minous ; and it is stated, on this authority, that true bitumen has never been formed by any artificial pro- cess hitherto devised, either from the resins or other vegetable substances : products resembling it in odour when burned and in otiier properties, have been obtained — but the effects of alcohol or water always proved these products not to be bitumen. '' But synthesis of natural products,'' observes Mr. Hatchett, although required in strict chemical demonstration, is (as we have but too often occasion to know) seldom to be obtained, especially when operations are performed on bodies whose component parts are liable to an in- finite series of variations in their proportions, qualities, and modes of combination. Considering, therefore,** proceeds our authority, that bitumen and resin afford by certain operations similar products ; that resin and

62 Natural History Of Coal.

bitumen ajre found blended together by nature, and that this mixed substance accompanies a species of coal which in many parts still exhibits its vegetable origin, whilst in others it passes into pit-coal, we may, with the greatest probability, conclude, that bitumen is a modification of the resinous and oily parts of ve- getables, produced by some process of nature, which has operated by slow and gradual means on immense masses, so that even if we were acquainted with the process, we should scarcely be able to imitate its ef- fects, from the want of time, and deficiency in the bulk of the materials. But although bitumen cannot at present be artificially formed from the resinous and other vegetable substances by any of the known che- mical processes, yet there is every reason to believe, that the agent employed by nature in the formation of coal and bitumen has been either muriatic or sul- phuric acid ; and when it is considered that common salt is never found in coal mines, except when in the vicinity of salt springs, whilst on the contrary, pyrites, sulphate of iron, and alum, most commonly are pre- sent ; these facts, together with the sulphureous odour emitted by most of the mineral coals when burned, appear strongly to evince the agency of the latter. That this has been the case, seems also to be corro- borated by the great resemblance which the coals formed artificially from many vegetable substances bear to the mineral coals ; especially as the similarity is not confined to external characters, but extends to other properties. It may be added that, by the action of sulphuric acid on vegetable bodies, a much greater portion of their carbon is converted into coal, than when the same are subjected to the effects of fire." In fiirther illustration of the now so generally adi-

Submerged Wood. 63

mitted change of vegetable matter into coal, by what- ever process, and in addition to what has been said in reference to peat, it will be found that our own island presents us with a tripartite series of fossil com- bustible substances, the intermediate member of which exhibits, in a striking manner, the coal in that stage of partial mineralization, which appears so con- clusive in favour of the theory of a ligneous origin : as an illustration of the most recent deposition, or modem member of this threefold series, may be men- tioned the submarine forest on the coast of Lincoln- ahire, the timber of which has not suffered any very important change in its vegetable character. There are several other accumulations of wood in different parts of the kingdom — in some cases the remains of forests known to have been existing within the period embraced by our annals. Occasionally, the sub- stratum of our immense peat depositions consists, as previously noticed, of vegetable remains of a much larger order than those forming the superior beds — trees of various descriptions, the species in many in- stances readily distinguishable, and affording by their exhumation, not only supplies of fuel, but even tim- / ber for various economical purposes. Striking ex- amples of this latter circumstance are daily taking place in Holdemess, a large triangular district, con- sisting chiefly of peat moors, and tracts formed by the sediment of ancient inundations, bounded on one side by the German Ocean, on another by the es- tuary of the Humber, and on the third by the chalk formation of the Yorkshire Wolds.f TTie other ex-

Described by Coirea de Sem, in FhiL Trans. 1799.

t John Phillips, in Phil. Mag. April, 1834. p. 383. Mr. De U Beche (Geological Manual, p. 166) gives a condae but interesting aocoont of seve* ral of these ligneous accomiiladons, as noticed by yarious writexs.

64 Natural History Of Coal.

treme series of ligneous matter, and which has under- gone the most entire change, compmes the varieties of pit-coal, so abundant in many parts of this country, and in which almost every appearance of vetable oiiirin has been destroyed. The formation apparentlT I eqljmnotefrom thf two extremes* jut no but ' which nevertheless discloses peculiarities singularly analagous to both of them, is brown coal, (the braun- kohlen of German Mineralogists) found abundantly in some parts of the world. In this country it is represented by the well-known strata of bituminous j wood, called Bovey coal, which exhibits a series of gradations from the most perfect ligneous texture, to a substance nearly approaching the characters of pit- coal, and, on that account locally distinguished by the name of stone coal. This foeedl which is believed to have been deposited posterior to the chalk forma- ) tion, and which is denominated from the place where lb' it has long been found — Bovey-Tracey, near Chud-j/

leigh, in Devonshire — was first largely described by Dr. Milles in a letter to the Earl of Macclesfield, President of the Royal Society, 1 760 ;f it was also

Lignites, which are manifestly bitaminized wood, hold an intermediate place in the gradation between regetable matter and pit coaL They hare the fibre of fhe former, with the jetty lustre and fracture of the latter. Some lignites closely resemble peats in their chemical characters; others seem to graduate into perfect coal. It is, therefore, the geological position in the coal measures that determines this combustible. WhateTer is found in the strata aboTO the magnesian limestone has been called a lignite coal adds Dr. Ure, (Geology, p. 172,) from whom this passage is taken, is in fact to vegetable matter, whatadipocire is to animsl; the completion of the chemical change, in which the fibrous structure disappears. Lignite has generally a woody aspect ; coal always that of a rock.

t Philosophical Transactions, voL li., p. 536.— The Bovey coal has been worked about a century; and the whole area explored in that time may amount to nearly twelre acres. The coal is mostly used for steam engines and in the burning of lime, and occasionally in the manufacture of earthen- ware. It is not used at present for domestic purposes, its sulphureous exha- lations being not only disagreeable, but noxious.

r

Bovey Coal. 65

made the subject of a series of experiments by Mr. Hatchett, the details of which were laid before that iUuslrious body in 1804 and 1806, and from which details many of the pardculars of the present treatise are taken. On comparing the two accounts, it is impossible not to be struck with the remarkable dif- iCTence which the effect of the progress of science for about half a centory, had in determining to such op- posite conclusions, the opinions of two philosophical indiyidnals, having the same substance before them. The olject of Dr. Milles in his remarks was to es- tablish the hypoihesb, that this and similar substances are not of regetable but of mineral origin ; and to prove this, he adduces a great number of cases, most of which, however, in the present state of natural history and of chemistry, must be regarded as proving the contrary.

The Bovey coal is found in strata, corresponding, in almost every particular, with the fossil wood of Iceland, called surturbrand, described by Von Trofl, Bergmann, and others. The different strata of both these substances are likewise similar, being composed of wood or trunks of trees, which have completely lost their cylindrical form, and are perfectly flattened, as if they had been subjected to an immense degree of pressure. The succession and thickness of the strata at Bovey axe thus described by Mr. Parkinson :

Ft in.

Stratam, No. l...Thicbies8 1 0

o

7 - n

Ft. ia.

StratitiD, No. 11... Thickness 0 6

12 2 O

16 Little bed.. 1 0

17 Last bed... 2 7

Natural History Of Coal,

The aonexed sketch (Jig. 2.Jt taken from Parkinson, shews the arrangement of strata ; the black parts, lettered a b c d and £, represent layers of coal corresponding with the fore- going Nos. 5 to 9 inclusiye; the lined portions are strata of an inferior kind of coal, not worth taking up ; and the white spaces indicate argilla- ceous strata — the uppermost of these, or that between the fiAh and sixth bed of coal, being ten feet thick, including the two pseudo seams ; and that between the sixth and seventh beds, also inclu- ding two worthless strata, is eight feet thick. The lower coal strata furnish the best and strongest sub- stance for burning. The shaft from the grass to the bottom of the last coal stratum, is seventy-five feet deep. It has been bored thirty-three feet still deeper, but nothing was discovered, except a muddy kind of clay, intermixed with sand. The disposition of the strata is displayed by their method of working : they begin at the top, and clear away to the distance of eight or ten fathoms, and work down, in a perpendi- cular direction, through the various strata to the bot- tom of the shaft : then recommence their operations. The direction of the strata at Bovey, is from north to south ; the inclination or dip tending to the latter. This inclination was stated by Mr. Scammell, who furnished Parkinson with the particulars of this coftl, to be about one foot in six : the leading part is from

Organic Remains, vol. i., p. 134.

Bovey Coal. 67

east to west : the northern port bassets or comes to the surface, withm an hundred yards of the shaft, where it is cut off by a bed of sand ; to what depth the southern extremity reaches had not been, and probably cannot be ascertained : it has been found, however, to extend a quarter of a mile. The eastern portion extends more than seven miles, though the western has not been traced more than two miles. The whole deposit is said to occupy a kind of basin, or ancient valley.

This formation is by no means peculiar to Devon- shire— nor even to Great Britain : strata of bitumi- nous wood are found in various parts of France, in the vicinity of Cologne, in Hesse, Bohemia, Saxony, Italy, and especially in Iceland as already mentioned. The Bovey coal is conmionly of a chocolate-brown, and sometimes almost black. The quality and tex- ture are various in different strata: from some of these, it is obtained in the form of straight flat pieces three or four feet in length, resembling boards, and, therefore, called board-coal : thin pieces of this kind, when first dug, and while moist, will bend somewhat like horn ; but as it dries it loses its elasticity, and becomes brittle. The sectile appearance in some specimens, cut and polished by Mr. Witham, is very beautiful, and comparatively regular. Others have an oblique, wavy, and undulating texture, and, as Dr. Milles observes, have a strong resemblance to the roots of trees, from which, most probably, this sort has, in a great measure, been formed. Some kinds, also, appear to be more or less intermixed with earth ; but that which produces the most powerful and lasting fire, is called stone-coal ; it is black, with a glossy fracture : has little or none of the vegetable texture ;

F 2

68 Natural History Of Coal.

is more solid and compact tlian the others, being almost as heavy as some of the pit-coals, the nature of which it seems nearly to approach. Mr. Hatchett submitted the wavy species of Bovey coal to chemical examination, and found that 200 grains by distillation yielded : —

Graint.

1 . Water, which soon came over acid, and afterwards

turbid, by the mixture of some bitumen 60

2. Thick brown oily bitumen 21

3. Charcoal 90

4. Mixed gas, consisting of hydrogen, carbonated

hydrogen, and carbonic acid, estimated at 29

The charcoal, by incineration, left about four grains of yellowish ashes, consisting of alumina, iron, and silica ; but it was remarkable that there was not the smallest trace of alkali. No extractive substance was derived on digesting the coal in boiling water : but by digestion in alcohol a tincture was foimed, which, by evaporation, afforded a substance possessing all the properties of resin, and proving that the whole of the proximate principles of the original vegetable r have not been entirely changed — a small portion of true resin, not converted into bitumen, (the ultimate effect of those causes which convert vegetable matter into coal,) still remains inherent in the mass.

The Bovey coal is not only bitmninised to the degree intimated above, but there are indications of an excess of inflammable matters of this class ; Dr. MiUes observes, that, Amongst the clay, but ad<- hering to the coal, are found lumps of a bright yellow loam, extremely light, and so saturated with petro- leum, that they bum like sealing-wax, emitting a

Accumulation Of Lignites. 69

very agreeable and aromatic scenC This substance, however, Mr. Hatchett has found not only to be of a craiposition remote from that suspected by Dr. M illes, but totally different from any of the bitumens hitherto discorered, consisting partly of resin, and partly of asphaltus, and hence it has been called Retinasphal- turn.

One objection formerly urged against the vegetable origin of coal, as it partakes less of a chemical or even philosophical than of an historical character, becomes weak in proportion as our knowledge of the extent of causes formerly and actually in operation, is in- creased. Dr. IVClles, in the Remarks already ad- verted to, in enumerating the reasons why he con- siders the Bovey coal to be not of a vegetable, but of a mineral origin, says, In the first place, there does not seem to be any imaginable cause in nature, which could bring together such a mass of fossil wood, as is found in this, and other strata of the like kind m different parts of Europe. It extends here [at Bovey], to the depth of seventy feet : in that at Munden [in Germany], they have sunk fifty feet, without coming to the bottouu** There are few persons at the present day, so unacquainted with the signal monuments of diluvial action on the different portions of the earth's surface, as to find any difficulty in conceiving that fl .remendou. Ltgj. wM.v i. m./ We been, which has collected vast mountains of marine exuviae, would be abundantly adequate to bring to- gether vegetable masses equal to any bituminous fossil strata in the known world. It is by no means necessary to imagine that they have been transported firom any great distance, though that supposition would contain in it nothing improbable.

70 Natural History Of Coal.

That there might be some peculiar conditions in the exuberance and chemical nature of piimeyal vege- tation seems probable. M . Brongniart (in Prodramus - cles VegeU Fossiles 1818,) was the first who, in ex- plaining the carbonised nature of coal, thought it necessary to suppose that the atmosphere once con- tained a much larger proportion of carbonic acid gas than it does now. He assimies that as it might happen that there was then much less mould, plants must need have lived by absorbing, through the leaves, and appropriating to themselves, much carbon taken from the air. M. Th. de Saussure has de- monstrated, that a proportion of two, three, four, and even eight per cent, of carbonic acid gas in the air, may be favourable to vegetation. In this way the : gigantic height of plants at an early period is thought to be explained : while the simultaneous existence of / many reptiles and tlie absence of mammalia is deemed ' / to accord with the hypothesis.f

Be CandoUe. Edin. PML Joum, Jan. 1835.

t This theory is eleganUy expounded by Mr. Burnet, Professor of Botany in King's College, London, as follows : — The office of ferns and the other H ' plants of the coal formation, and the final cause of their predominance in . . that period, would seem from numerous facts to be, that by their assimilation ' of the carbon, and liberation of the oxygen with which it was combined, they- might purify the atmosphere, and bring it into a condition in which it would . " become respirable by reptiles, beasts and man. That such was the primitive condition of the atmosphere, and that it was thus gradually purified by the ' growth of plants, seems to be not improbable, from the circumstance that reptiles and other cold blooded animals, which can f ndnre and exoy an atmosphere that would be fatal to warm blooded animals and man, are the earliest of which any fossil remains are found. That the atmosphere at first was very geatly loaded with carbonic acid, is probable from reptiles not i appearing until after the coal formation : and that it required many sue- cessive generations of plants to render it respirable for birds and beastsj is also Ukcly, as it is not until long after, that any vestiges of these animals U are found. These were the immediate precursors of the human race, the . sovereigns of a world which they underprize, and of which they little know the wonderful structure or the surpassing beauty.*'

Recent Drift Timber, 71

As to the supply of the material itself, we have no reason to doubt but that, assuming the more ancient coal formation to consist of land yegetables analagous in their original growth to the largest trees at present known, the forests of the antediluvian world, might furnish a sufficient supply, if we merely judge from what we know of the exuberant growth of intertropical vegetation in our own times. To say nothing of what must be the fossil contents of a basin or valley into which some partial deluge should sweep one of the immeasurable forest tracts of North or South America, there are accumulations of drift wood taking place on some of the rivers of that quarter of the globe, which, whether destined to become coal strata, as some think, or otherwise, may, at some re* motely fixture period, when the land will perhaps be comparatively denuded, and other changes have taken place, present a problem of almost as disputable if / not difficult solution as that of the formation of ex- ' isting coal fields. In the spring, or rather winter,'' A says Captain Basil Hall, when the freshes or floods come down, they bring with them millions of trunks

Spealdng of an epocha of the antediloYian world, when the ocean is supposed to hare possessed a much higher degree of temperatnre, and the earth to hare been circomfosed with a moist and tepid atmosphere, far different from what we see at present — " the first age of the world/' says Dr. lire, then, extending probably through soTeral centuries, Ailly realised the uni- ▼ersal and unfading spring of the poets. Under such fostering powers of regetation, the coal-measure plants were matured, in countless myriads, with a rapidity to which modem experience can Aimish no paraUeL" As at the period, and according to the hypothesis alluded to, the differenoe between equatorial and polar temperatures would be at first comparatiTely small, so a considerable uniformity of vegetation would pervade the most distant zones. ''We need not, therefore," adds the authority above quoted, "be surprised at finding the same eahmites, or gigantic equisetums, buried among the coal- measures of New Holland (near Port Jackson), and of England; though now a-days, that plants are subjected to the undivided empire of the sun they differ in species with very moderate variations of latitude ; and with every change of hemisphere,"

72 Natural History Of Coal.

of trees technically called logs. In February or March, the quantity of these logs is sometimes so great, that not only the river itself, but the sea for several miles off, was so completely covered over with them, that it required some skill to get through. The whole ground, — if the loose and muddy soil could be so called, — ipeared to be formed of layers of these logs, matted together into a network, or rather a gigantic raft of rough timbers, many yards, and peihaps fathoms in depth, over hundreds of square leagues. May not this stratum of vegetable matter,** asks the philosophic traveller, which there is every reason to suppose stretches over the whole delta at the level of the sea, become in acme future geological revolution of the world a great coal-field.** Speaking of the great river Atchafiilaya, and its enormous raftage. Captain Hall adds: ''the river just mentioned flows out of the Mississippi at a point about 250 miles from the sea. Twenty-seven miles from the efflux the raft begins, and extends over a space of twenty nules : but as the whole distance is not filled up with timber, the aggregate raft is only ten miles long. The width of the Atchafalaya is 220 yards ; the raft extends from bank to bank, and is supposed to be about eight feet thick. It has been accumulatiug for more than fifty years, and is made annually larger, by supplies of trees drifted into the river from the Mississippi.** In all likelihood, this immense aggregation of drift-wood will continue to increase, until in process of time it may become covered with sand, and afterwards with vegetation of the higher order, as already at certain seasons it is gay with verdiure and flowers,* and after a succession

De la Bechc disparages the idea which has been promulgated relative

Remote Or Local Origin Of Coal. 78

of ages, present either a seam of coal, or at least an accumulation of the analagous lignites. Various and conflicting opinions have been enter- tained by geologists, as to the original places of growth of Ihe vegetable matters composing the great coal deposits ; including the question as to whether or not they still occupy the stations where they grew. Scnne have contended that they may have floated for a long time, and from vast distances, before they sunk into their present beds, and became interstra- tified by the successive subsidences of stony and other matter. Others fancy they have had an inland origin, having sprung up and tluiven on the borders of vast lakes, into which they have ultimately been >swept by some sufficient agency. This lacustrine theory, is in turn objected to, on the ground that the traces of plants in some superjacent strata appear rather to indicate a littoral or marine vegetation; hence the bituminous beds have been deemed of Polynesian or insular derivation. Mr. Conybeare, however, is disposed to think that the coal vegetables ' were accumulated in friths and sBstuaries, and after- wards buried there with the alluvial detritus that was / swept away with them. Some inferences relative to the original formation of the great carbonaceous deposits of England and Scotland have been drawn from the character of the vegetable remains interspersed throughout each series. In the coal-fields of Newcastle, Durham, and York- shire, impressions and remains of ciyptogamia exist in great profusion, while in the Edinburgh and Lothian basins imprints of ferns are so rare as to be reckoned curiosities. Such is the statement of Mr.

to the great compactness of this raft, especially what has been said atjont large trees growing upon it. Gtol. Man. p. 72.

74 Natural History Of Coal.

Witham : hence, according to that - gentleman's hypothesis, " if we take it for granted that the coal seams are formed hy the deposition of vegetable matter, produced either on the spot where it is now found, or brought from a distance, we can easily offer an explanation for the differences found to exist be- tween the coal-fields of England above alluded to, and the Scotch basins, in regard to the occurrence of fossil vascular cryptogamic plants and their impres- sions. In a [comparatively] flat country like North- umberland, Durham, and Yorkshire, surrounded by mountains of no great elevation, from which a supply of more perfect wood could have been obtained, the vast mass of carbonaceous matter deposited must have resulted from vegetables growing on the spot, and this may have had its origin in a great measure from the vascular cryptogamic plants which a marshy country, such as it might have been, would have produced in great abundance, and with a luxuriance of which we can now have but little conception, unless we contemplate the profuse vegetation of the Tropics. The Scotch coal basins, on the contrary, seem to have been formed in large inland lakes or hollows, produced by the expansion of immense bodies of water. In these lakes or hollows, the produce of vast forests, which may have existed in the valleys of the high regions, may have been earned down by eddies and currents. As these trees had grown at great elevations, most of those carried along by the great rivers and their tributary streams may have consisted of coniferae, or plants possessing a structure closely allied to that of our present pines.f

Dr. D&nrin supposed that bitumen or petroleum, with jet, amber, and all the fossil coal in the world, owe their inflammable part to the recrements of destroyed forests of terebinthinate vegetables.

f Witham's Fossil Vegetables, p. 9.

Various Opinions. 75

f Sharon Turner has assumed, as a not impro- bable circumstance, that the coal beds in every country represent to us where the chief localities and j exuberance of the primaeval vegetation were situate. Wherever they occur, there may we presume the ancient plants were profusely standing when the transposing catastrophe came upon them. A deluge offers rational causes to us, for this destructive but ultimately useful change.f The great torrents of

The lacustrine or flaHatile origin of our ool deporiU, haa been itiongly supported, not only from the charsder of the vegetable remains, bnt more particiilarly from the presence of fresh water shells, &c. and the apparent absence of marine testacea. It eeems, however, that the latter conclusion has been anamed loo hastily — marine remains, having lately been disooverad in contact with the coal formation about Leeds and Halifax. This drcum- Btanoe, together with the fact of large petrified stems baring been found rising in a Tertical position through various strata, have afforded ftesh grounds for resuming the theory rather of a sudden diluvial cause in the formation of coal beds, than that of an indefinitely alow process of deposition trom. the action of lakes or rivers. Some of these petrified atema, which are found projecting through beda of coal, of ahale, and of aandstone, have been supposed to occupy the places where they grew. This, however, has been objected to, and apparently with reason, as an unnatnral idea" ; for where, it ia enquired, ahall we find a tree of fifty or rixty feet in length, m a growing tiaie, and enduring patiently the tardy process of slow lacuitriHe depoiitian by which iu lofty top shall be as well preserved for the inspection of ftiture geologists, as the roots which are nourished in the looae aands which cover them f " If, then," proceeda Mr. Fairholme, we find an in- superable argument againat the theory of a $Unp deposition, in undefined period3 of great extent, in theae entire treea which intersect varioua parte of the coal meaaures, to what apeciea of action are we to attribute the rapidity of formaticm which theae caihonomtterB, if I may ao call them, ao plainly indicate t Are we to ascribe thia rapidity of action merely to the formation of the actual atrata in which auch treea have been found, or are we, on the contrary, to extend the principle by fair analogy, to other portiona of the aeries both ahove and below these interesting and instructive indexes t We may surely be permitted to relMon from analogy, that if any one portion of an extensive series, exhibiting throughout a similarity of character, can be proved to demonstration to have been depoaited in ao ahort a apace of time as to cover up and retain in equal pretervoHon a vertical atem 60 or 70 feet in length, the other portiona of the aame aeriea must have been depoaited in a manner extremely aimilar, if not .atrictly identicaL If we have, then, a reasonable ground for auch conclusion, can we continue to look upon the

Supposed Agency Of Fire. 77

sort of coal. Some process, therefore, independent of these drcmnstances, must have taken place, in order that the vegetable substances, such as ligneous matter, resin, oil, &c., should become coal and bitumen. The agency of fire was naturally enough at an early period of the investigation, supposed to have bei one of the co-efficients in transforming vegetable matter into coal. Modem chemistry* had made comparatively but a small progress, when the illus- trious Bergxnann published his Dissertation entitled Produeta Igms Mbterraam chemici catmderata ; for, at that time, the extent and power of chemical action in the humid way, were very imperfectly understood. In that part, however, of the above work, where he speaks of the fossQ wood of Iceland called surtur- brand, he evidently appears doubtful how far volcanic fire may have acted upon it ; although he conceives that in the formation of it, there has been some con- liection with volcanic operations. His words are, Quid de ligno fossili Islandiae sentiendum sit, gnaro in loco natali contemplatori decittendum reUnqmmm. Interea, ut cum vulcani operationibus nexum cre- damus, plures snadent rationes, quamvis hucusque modum ignoremus, quo situm texturamque adquisive* runt haec strata." It was certainly very natuiBl, pro- ceeds Mr. Hatchett, that Beimann should entertain this opinion, in respect to the surturbrand ; and it is remarkable that a schistus embedding the real sub- stance of alder leaves in an apparently half charred state, and seemingly unknown to the celebrated che- mist above named, appears to be of the same nature,

Hatcliett's Obierratioiis, PhU. Truis. toL 94, p. 408-9.

78 Natural History /Of Coal.

and is found in the same country. The leaves de- scribed by Mr. St. Fond, as enclosed in a sort of marie, are also similar, and found in a country which, according to him, was formerly yolcanic. Were these substances, therefore, never foimd but in coun- tries which either actually are or were volcanic, we should be almost compelled to believe, with the Swedish Professor, that the operations of subterra- neous fires have been concerned in the formation of these bodies, or rather in the conversion of them into their present state.

But similar circumstances are found in countries where not the smallest vestige of volcanic effects can be discovered, and Devonshire most undoubtedly is such; yet, nevertheless, the Bovey coal is there found similar to the surturbrand in most of its exter- nal and chemical properties, and in forming regular strata. Moreover, the half-charred appearance pre* sented by both these fossils, cannot be adduced as any proof, that the original vegetable bodies have been exposed to the partial effects of subterraneous fire ; for it is now well known that the oxidisement of sub- stances is performed, at least as frequently, and as effectually, by the humid as by the dry way.* Fos- sil charcoal, or wood which appears to have been exposed to the direct action of fire, does indeed occur, as well in the coal measures of this country as in other parts of the globef ; it must not, however, be

Trans, of fhe Liniian Society, toI. iv. p. 141.

f Near to Cerro in Pern, there are numerous beds of fossil ohsrcoal, of a quality that may be used for heating steam engines, and the like purposes. The principal bed lies between strata of fine sandstone. Geologists have been somewhat perplexed to account for these terrified deposits ; it has been thought that a phenomenon recorded by Dr. Richardson, the naturalist, in Captain Franldin's expedition of discovery, respecting the shale on the

Marine Vegetables. 79

confounded with the lignites now under consideration. It remains, now, that we notice one other theoiy, which certainly appears plausible, if not probable.

Allusion has already been made to the experi- ments of Mr. Hatchett, and his own acknowledgment that the synthetic result was imperfect. Neither that able chemist, nor Dr. Mac CuUoch, could ever obtain bitumen from carbonated oak, which substauce is ne- vertheless an essential ingredient in true coal : the former gentleman, therefore, concluded his researches by entirely referring the production of bitumen to some unknown process of nature in the transmutation of wood. But, with all the deference which is so justly due to that eminent chemist, I must beg leave,'' says Granville Penn, '' to suggest, that it would seem to be time enough to resort to that ultimate principle when all previous means of research shall have been exhausted, which does not yet appear to be the case. Experiments have, indeed, been skilfully made on vegetable matter ; but they have hitherto been made on terrestrial vegetable matter only. It seems to have been entirely forgotten in these investigations, that terrestrial vegetation is only one part of universal vegetation ; and that immense tracts of marine veffe tation flourish in all parts of the bed of the sea. We may form a sufficient judgment, from the vast quan-

coasts of the Arctic Sea maj besf on the qaestioo. This shale composed piecipitons banks, which in many places were actnally on fire. The com- bustion originates, according to Dr. Richardson, in the circumstance of the shale containing a conaderable quantity of sulphur in a state of such mi- nute diTision, that it Tery readily attracts oxygen from the atmosphere, and in£ames. " Nothing, I think,'* says Mr. Rennie, " could explain in a more satisfactory manner the occurrence of charcoal in coal measures and other mineral strata. In the anthracite mines of North America, for exsmple, wood charcosl occurs, with the ligneous structure as well marked as in the charcoal recently prepared."

y

80 Natural History Of Coal.

tity of fiici aod other marine plants vulgarly united under the denomination of sea weeds, wldch are con- tinuallj cast upon our coasts, and which are com- monly used for fuel in the islands of Jersey and Guernsey, of the immense quantities of these tribes of vegetation that must be contained in the different basins and depths of the sea* That the great majority of naturalists, who inhabit the interior of the Europenn continent, should overlook this vast portion of vege- tation amidst the interminable forests with which they see themselves surrounded, would be less surprising than that we should neglect to remark it, the founda- tions of whose soil are every where encompassed by it." 'Now, since all naturalists," proceeds Mr. Penn, are agreed in this one point, that our present con- tinents were heretofore the bed of the sea; since beds of coal are found to lie in concavities varying greatly in extent, from a few to many miles, and containing numerous strata of coal, alternating with sand-stone, clay, &c. which describes a formation analagous to an ancient sea bed ; since marine sub stances are found in the acyoining strata ; since nu- merous sea shells,* and even bones of marine animals, are found in imperfect coal, as in that of Pomiers, in Dauphiny, although none remain recognizable in perfect coal ; — a strong argument of probability seems to arise, that, if the substance of coal is of vegetable origin, we are to seek for that origin in marine vege-

Some of the lower beds of the ooal may have been deriyed in part from marine forests, if the oocasional oocunence of salt-water testaoea be admit- ted as proof: " but there are at least upper and middle coal strata 1000 feet in thickness, and seyersl hundreds of square miles in extent, without a sin- gle Testige of marine lemains/' It is at the same time confidently affirmed, that no unexceptionable specimen of a marine pUmt embedded in rock has erer yet been produced.

Origin Of Coal From Fuci. 81

tatioii ; that the beds of coals, in their extensive con- cavities, were immense accumulations of /tici, Sec, loaded with the various animal substances that shelter among them, which were overwhelmed by vast agge-

j rations of the loose soils of the sea in the course of its retreat, and were left for decomposition and re- composition by the chemical action of the marine fluid which they contained, and with which the enclosing and compressing soils were saturated : under which compression they had lain in course of bituminisation and mineralization, for some thousands of years be- fore they were brought to light 'entirely dissolved and recomposed in their elements, so as to be con- verted into the fossil masses to which we give the name of coal/ In this class of vegetation, so cir- cumstanced,'* adds our author, it is perhaps possi-

N ble, that the ingredient mht yet be found, which

/ was uniformly wanting in the carbonisation of wood

earthy growth."*

The notion, once more prevalent than at present, that the coal strata are derived from the covering up of ancient peat bogs, appears to derive no support from evidence — for the analogy subsisting between certain relations in the carboniferous series, and sec- tions of some interstratified turbaries, however it may illustrate the process by which vegetable matter be- comes converted into coal, affords no indications of a common origin. For, however unreasonable it might be to expect to find the remains of any of the nume- rous mosses which enter into the composition of re- cent peat, in strata where almost every trace of the original organisation of plants presumed to have been

Fenn's Comparative Estimate, toI. H. p. 187.

G

82 Natural History Of Coal,

SO much better fitted to resist decomposition is ob- literatedy still the associate shales do frequently pre- sent us with impressions of matters scarcely, if at all, less delicate in structure. It is, moreover, judging from the present state of thii, not probable that tracts of moss covered large portions of the earth at the era of the coal formation, in common with plants, the remains of which are allowed to indicate the con- currence of intertropical vegetation, but not of the bogormalioim of tenrate .nd polar region,.

That the common Mtominous coal, so abundant in this countiy, and in 4ihe eastern Ccmtinent, as well as in some parts of North America, owes its origin to vegetable depositions of some kind, at whatever time, or under whatever circumstances these have taken place, may be said to be all but universally admitted itpreBt Itoy nmen, glogiM., however. hardly yet satisfied to refer the vast mountains of matter, apparently so much farther removed firom ligneous identity as the anthracite appears to be, to the same cause. To this reference they have found an objection which, to them, seems of itself insuper- able, in the vast quantity of this useful mineral. But is this objection really insuperable ? Does it not proceed from a limited view of the operations of na- ture, from a disinclination to allow sufficient time for the execution of her stupendous designs P Many errors in geological science are justly attributable to an erroneous or limited estimate of time ; and yet the eloquent chronicles of inanimate nature tell us of ellge, in the eenafitoti™. .f the globe whid. we inhabit, for the accomplishment of which ages must have been requisite. How many years must have rolled away, after the disruption of the original rock.

Anthracite. 83

l)efore the sandstone fonnation attained its present degree of compactness. Those, therefore, who deny that the anthracite is of vegetable origin, must bring forward some other objection than the want of time : and if they found their objection upon the depth and extent of this fonnation, we urge the analogy of the bituminous coal, and thus sustain the claim of the antiiracite to a vegetable origin. It will not be de- nied that the power which could create mineral car- bon, could also create vegetable carbon, and after- wards by some great convulsion, subject it to an irre- sistible force. The foregoing are the sentiments of Mr. Bunker, an American writer, whose opinions are given in Silliman's Joiunal. Indeed,'' continues this gentleman, it seems to me more in unison with the other arrangements of Providence, that the vege- tables which beautified the face of the earth, for the happiness of one race of beings, should afterwards when those beings had passed away, be stored up for the use of other successive generations of men." But ihe object of Mr. Bunker's communication to the Journal above-named is not, he says, engage in the discussion of the question, whether anthracite coal is of vegetable origin, except so far as may be necessary in the exhibition of the testimony which I am able to produce in support of that opinion. Mr. Bakewell, in his introduction to geology, asserts/ that no vegetable impressions have ever been disco- vered in the anthracite, and I believe that most geologists are of the same opinion. I have been so fortunate as to obtain from a small quantity of Schuylkill coal, six specimens, proving that trees were at least present when the coal was formed, if vegetable matter is not maierial. The best specimen

G 2

84 Natural History Of Coal.

presents the longitudinal section of a piece of wood, ten inches long and two inches broad. Another spe- cimen exhibits a similar section six inches long. A third contains a bit of wood one inch square, and one tenth of an inch in thickness, and this piece could be easily detached. Another specimen exhibits a sec- tion of wood, from four to five inches long, and about three inches in width. The grain of this piece resem- bles that of the oak. A fiflii contains a section four inches by three. The th is the counterpart of the fifth : the two pieces being the parts of a larger spe- cimen, the cleft of the coal dividing the wood equally and similarly, leaving a portion in each division. These specimens exhibit not impressions merely, but real wood, resembling charcoal, although softer. In examining coal, I have often found indentations, which by the aid of the imagination, could be magni- fied into vegetable impressions ; but I never before found real wood. About the specimens which I pos- sess, there can be but two suppositions. Either this wood was introduced in some incomprehensible mode into the heart of the solid mass of the coal, or else it is a remnant, not whoUy consolidated, of the material from which the coal was formed. I believe that the latter supposition is more philosophical, and conse- / quently more rational than the former."

Silliman's Ameripan Jouma!, 1833.

Chapter V.

Organic Remains.

Opinions of the Ancients concerning Organic Remains — Equivocal generation — Operation of plastic and forming energies — Conditions of vegetable remains — Families of plants existing at the period when the Coal beds were deposited — Plants of the upper Coal — Cyeadiform fronds — lAgneous fossHs of the true Coal formation — Mr. Withams observations — Mo- difgmg causes of the variety of casts of stems disco vered in different substances — Figures and descrip tions — Microscopical examination of the minute structure of fossil bodies — Probability that trees of the more complicated woody structure y as well as the merely vascular and cellular kinds, existed at the period of the Coal formation — Fossil fishes — Mus-- cles — Question of toads found alive in the Coal rocks — Huttons observations on the traces of exists ing vegetable tissues in the perfect kinds of Coal

XT maj now be interesting to advert somewhat more particularly to those phenomena which bring the coal formation into such immediate contact with the traces .or remains of organic matter : and, although it is almost entirety in the rocks subjacent to, or incum- bent upon, the carboniferous strata, that we meet with

86 Organic Remains.

such abundant and diversified remains of the animal world, yet has the latter series always, when pene- trated, attracted the attention of philosophers to its appropriate suites of vegetable exuvia.*

The ancients, who were carefully observant of na- tural appearances, could not fail to become in some measure acquainted with the fossil remains of organic bodies — those medals of creation," as the illustrious Bergmann has strikingly designated them. They were, however, sadly puzzled to account for their origin. Hence, they supposed the various lapides figuraiiy lapides idiomorphi, lapides qui jiguram hor- bent concluBy cochlea, &c., as they were cautiously called, to have had some equivocal seminal origin, and to have grown, during an anomalous sort of life, in the situations where they were found : while other and later writers referred the production of those or- ganic fossils to a principle which they announced un- der such conveniently ambiguous terms as the vis plastica and the vis formativa. These theories were not merely applied to solve the knotty problem of animal reliquiae, but also to account for those accu- mulations of bituminous wood which were so fire- quently discovered, and the striking dendritic forms of which were supposed to have arisen firom tendencies to such formation inherent in the bitumen. Andrea

The organic remains of the coal formadon are prodigiously nnmerons — especially of PtarUa. The list given by Mr. De la Beohe, and comprising fossils from this formation in all parts of the world, exhibits the names of the following numbers of species; Euphorbiacea, 9. Coni/era, 4. Doubtful Co- fi(/<nv, 10. DicotyUdonouapUmU of doubtful ttffltUty,fiO, PalmmZ, Camm 1. Monocotyledons of doubtful qffinUyj 14. Equiaatacea 15. FUice$, 118. LycopodiacetBy 61. Plants of uncertain affinity, 42. Of animal remains the list presents, PtMcet, 3. MoUutca, 14. Conch\feT€Ly 14. Among the latter are many marine remains which may perh>s belong rather to the strata alternating with the inferior rocks, than to the coal measures, in which, how- ever, some of them have certainly been found.

T

N

Exploded Theories. Si

Mattiola, an eminent botanist, embraced the notion of Agricola, a Gennan miner, who had written on the subject, that a certain materia pinguii)/* or fatty matter, made to ferment bj heat, gaye birth to fossil organic shapes. Of this opinion was Fallopio of Pa- dua, who not only conceived that petrified shells had been generated by fermentation in the spots where they are found, but gravely supposed that certain cu- rious antique vases dug up at Monte Testaceo near Rome, were natural impressions stamped in the soil ! Among the last supporters of the opinion of the ge Deration of these organic bodies in Ihe bowels of the earth, observes Mr. Parkinson, may be mentioned the celebrated Langius, who strenuously contended for their having thus obtained their forms and exist- enee ; Dr. Plott, who believed their figures to result firom the operation of certain plastic powers with which certain saline bodies were endowed ; and, lastly, Lhwyd, who combated the vis plastica of Plott, and supported the idea of their production from the send- na of fishes, &c., raised with vapours from the sea, and conveyed, by the clouds and rain, through crevices or fissures into the internal parts of the earth. The more rational conjecture of Woodward, who attributed their situation to the effects of the general deluge, was rendered of less effect, in opposing these notions, from his having attributed to the waters of the deluge, an almost universal solvent power; by which, he supposed the rocks and mountains were melted down, and thus allowed the admission of these substances, not considering that by the same power, the organic bodies themselves would have been reduced to a mass not bearing their proper figures.*

Pr]dii8on, Org. Rem. L 33.

88 Organic Remains.

Regarding the inflammable matter of our Coal- fields as consisting chiefly, if not entirely, of accumu- lations of land vegetables once growing in the coun- tries where they are now found embedded, and not as the transported reliques of a Flora of other climes ; and finding in the proximate strata of shale, ironstone, or sandstone bodies, which, retain at least in the ex- ternal traces of their original organic character confi- gurations analagous to those of plants now only growing in tropical regions, scientific enquirers seem to be agreed in opinion, that, at the period when these plants flourished, the climate where they are now found must, to say nothing of other conditions, at least have been much hotter and moister than at present.

We may premise that, in examining these relics of a former world, whether in the mine, or as detached specimens, it is, necessary to decide carefully whether they be actual petrefactions, in other words organic matters penetrated and changed by the bituminising or lapidifying processes, or the mere infiltration of sand, clay, &c., into a cavity formed by the decay of lie original body after the enveloping subsbmce had hardened about it so as to form a mould, or only casts of such. The massive and often beautiful impressions of stems, raised from our coal mines occur in four diflerent conditions ; some consist of vegetables con- verted into carbonaceous clay, and still invested with their bark, reduced to the state of charcoal ; others exhibit impressions of the same plant, with tlie sur- face entire, upon clay, slate, or sandstone ; others are decorticated vegetables themselves ; and, lastly, others are impressions of these decorticated plants.

This riew of the subject, first espoused by Mr. Steinhaaer, has been Tory strikingly illustrated by a writer in "Loudon's Magazine of Natural History,"

Upper Coal Vegetables. 89

The subject of antediluvian botany has exercised the ingenuity of the shrewdest investigators of phy- sical phenomena, both in our own countiy and the Continent, with the advantage that the fossil Floras of the coal formation in different places are remark- ably similar. The naming and classification, how- ever, of fossil specimens, exhibiting for the most part such varying and equivocal characteristics, and often such slight analogies to existing genera, must, it is obvious, be so difficult a task, that comparatively little of systematic harmony can be expected ; and these difficulties increase as we descend from the compara- tively recent to the more ancient deposits. Mr. John Phillips, of the York Museum (Professor of Geology in King's College, London), has, in the first part of his interesting Illustrations of the Geology of Yorkshire," figured twenty species of monocotyledo- nous plants, as occurring in Uie coal associated with the liasic and oolitic beds about Whitby, and com- prising specimens belonging to the kindred families lycopodinse, equisetacese, filices, cycadese, and palmse, of Sternberg ; upon which he remarks that '' the result of all accurate enquiries into the nature and distribu- tion of fossil plants, is, that they consist of three great distinct groups of species, which occupy as many peculiar repositories in the series of secondary strata: one group lies above the chalk; (namely with the more recent lignites) another is included between the chalk and the lias (i. e. connected with the Whitby coal) and a third occupies the coal measures

(to]. Tiii. p. 34), where fignres are giren of fhe conditioiifl of the stems of Sempervitmm arboreimny Ltsm., in the piogresslYe stages of decay.

The great sonxce whence our geologists hare hitherto mainly drawn their knowledge of fossil plants, is the splendid work, the Flora der Vorwell of Count Sternberg.

90 Organic Remains.

and mountain limestone" — in otiier voids, is associated with the more ancient carboniierous deposits. " A cursory observer," adds Mr. Phillips, "may, perhtqra, be led to confound together the ferns and calamites of the coal district with the ferns and equiseta of the oolitic rocks : thoih to a botanical eye their differ- ence is very apparent : but who can mistake the lepi- dodendra of the former, the cycadiform ironds of die middle period, and the dicotyledenous leaves aud firoits wMch abound above the chalk ? " As a speci- men of a remarkable family of plants, the remains of which occur so extensively in the oolitic and liasic beds rig. a. umMniiiM.] lying above the

true coal forma- tion, jig. 3. in the margin is given from Plul- I lips : it is Ci/ea- p diies lanceolaius, ' and occurs with a variety of other species, about Whitby. Cycas, a term applied by Theophrastus to a palm tree, is now used to distinguish a natural order of vegetables, introduced by botanists and phy- tologists as a connecting link between the ferns and the palms ; they appear at the era of the Jura forma- tion, which is regarded as the equivalent of the oolite rocks of English geologists, and seem to have home an excessive relation to contemporaneous types, as compared with the present state of things. M. Brongniart is said to have obtained from the formation in question, seventeen species of fossil Cycadese, eleven

OeoLXorki. 133.

n

REMAIN8 OF PALMg. 91

of them beloDging to the genus 2janua : so that a hnnij, which now forms scarcely a thousandth part of the existing vegetation, and which flourishes only near the equator, at the period when the roestone was deposited, formed one half of the European vegetation.

Among the more striking vegetable remains dis- tributed in the coal formation, may be mentioned those usually identified with, or allied to, the genera of palms, pines, tree ferns, arborescent grasses, cac- tuses, and some of the verticillate plants. Almost all authors agree in representing the magnificent femfly of palmi, as having existed at a very early em of the vegetable world, and as being found buried with the others : and their remains, viz. firagments of stems, fit>nds, and firuits, are said to occur in the older coal formations. The singular structure of the wood of this genus of trees renders the identification of the fossil specimens apparently less difficult, though not absolutely certain: the Rev. W. D. Conybeare refers the trunks or stems thus discovered partly to anmdaceous plants, approximating to those now known ; and to a very peculiar order, distinghed by the cortical part being entirely covered by regular impressions, resulting from the petioles and fallen leaves, ranging round them in spiral lines — these have been supposed to belong partly to the palmace- ous order, and partly to anomalous forms, constituting

Be Caadolle, in Edin. FhiL Jonm. Tot zviii. p. S9. 1835 t The Ber. J. HodgKm, anthor of the Hitlory of Northmnberluid, layi : — " We have seen ean of barley, and the leaves of pine applet,** [ananas, or merely ftr cones 1] taken from the Bchistus enclosing the coal near New- caaOe. BeantifnUy distinct impressions, analagons lo those which Mr. Hodgson so confidently attributes to ears of barley," are before the writer of this note.

93 Organic Remains.

a transition link between these and the coniferoiis plants, similar to that already established in Professor Fig. 4. Sprengel'a Natural System. Fig. 4. is a fossU vetable, from the coal near i Buxton, in Derbyshire, where the p impressions are frequent. MartiD says the original was " doubtless one of the fir tribe." It may be doubted whether it were a small cone or stro- bilns, or merely a portion of a branch : analgous specimens frequently occur; and the ironstone nodules about Ket- ley, in Shropshire, sometimes contain beautiiiil lepidodendra and lepidostrobi, the place of the original vegetable being occupied with a dark sparry concretion, occa- sionally investing some portion of the woody stem.

A genus of plants, called by Dr. Martina, Yuccites, and which, he says, constitute a series allied to the palms, differs in structure from most of the monoco- tyledones, in having the stem broadly expanded above by a more or less perfect dichotomy, also makes its appearance among the primitive forms. Nor is it at all to be wondered at that such specimens should occur in our coal mines, apparently of the same order with plants of which we still have livii examples, as evidence of a former world, the most ancient of all our vegetable productions, and of which may be adduced as an instance the famous dnon tree of Oratava.

It must not be forgotten that when attempts are made to discriminate the genera of vegetables, sup- posed to have entered chiefly into die original com-

PelrificUa DeibisnsiB, UA>. 14.

Woody Tissue In True Coal. 03

poaition|)of the combustible beds of the carboniferous strata, no idea is thereby intended to be conveyed as if actual steins, impressions of plants, or ligneous structure, were ordinarily discernible in the mass of the true coal. Generally speaking, indeed, the very reverse of this is the fact. The vegetable matters, whose forms are so distinctly preserved, occur, for the most part, in the non-inflammable layers of the formation, the shale, the sandstone, the ironstone, &c.* It is the form and structure of fossil plants so situated, from which has been inferred the type of genera so changed by the union of chemical and me- chanical causes as to exhibit no seeming trace of the original oianization. Except in a few instances,'' says Mr. Witham, " I have ineffectually tried, with the aid of the microscope, to obtain some insight into the structure of coal. Owing to its great opacity, which is probably due to mechanical pressure, the action of chemical affinity, and the percolation of acidulous waters, all traces of organisation appear to have been obliterated. After frequent trials, how-

In ome instanoM gigantic stems oecnr, partaking of the nature of the tnta thnmi which thi pass ; in others thej are composed wholly of sandstone ; and again, as in the case of the celehrated Cndgleith fossil tree, they aro coated with coal : it is commonly the hark changed into coal wliich presents that beaatUhl figure-work so characteristic of the carbonaoeous reliqnia. In the measores immediately below, as well as those ahoTe the High Main coal in the neighbourhood of Newcastle, many large stems (Si- UlarU) have been foond in a rertical position. At Killingworth colliery they rose ten feet, passing throngh nearly as many strata of shale and sand- stone, and their roots spread oat in the shale. To adopt the words of Mr. de la Beche, we can scarcely lefhse to admit with Mr. Wood [who first de- cribed them] that these stems are exactly in the position in which they grew, the shale being the soil or mud in wliich they Tegetated." It appears more probable, that haying been torn up by the causes which accumulated the sedimentary beds, these trees may have floated from a distance on the water, or perhaps on the silt or mud into which their roots, first sinking by their superior graTity, determined them in the upright position in which they are found.

94 Organic Remains.

ever, I have at length been gratified by the discoTerf of a regular and beautiful texture in the centre of a piece of coal from the mountain limestone group. This, in many respects, indicates woody tissue, and undoubtedly leaves scope for our most sanguine ex* pectations.*' The traces of organisation are, however, obscure in the slice of coal represented by this gentle- man, especially as compared with the astonishing regularity of structure displayed by many fossil stems, exhibiting in several instances a texture as perfect as can be obtained from the most delicate section of a recent plant.

The late Rev. Henry Steinhauer, in a Memoir of Fossil Reliquia of Unknown Vegetables in the Coal Strata,*' communicated to the American Philo- sophical Society in 1817, figures a specimen under the name of PhytoUthus tesselattis, and the original of which, he says, assists in elucidating a circumstance very frequently attending these petrifactions, in which part of the original vegetable matter is transformed into stone. In such fossils the cast is sometimes very neat and complete, as in the present instance ; while the matrix, on the contrary, is very indistinct; at other times the cast is very obscure, while the matrix exhibits all the marking very exactly. From these observations, it would appear, that, sometimes the cast set or hardened before the matrix, sometimes the matrix before the cast ; and that one or the other continued soft after the vegetable matter had under- gone that degree of liquifaction, which must evidently have taken place before it was converted into that coally substance which we now find. When, on the cLj, vegetable matter redated decompoao. till both the cast and the matrix had become fixed, both

Recent And Fossil Stems. 95

must exhibit equally perfect traces of the original form, which is sometimes the case. It seems also impossible, from Uie above, to imagine the operation of fire to have had aoj share m effecting these changes.

Flff. a. represents this fossil fnmi Steinhaoer, and which is supposed to be identical with the Lepidodendron tette- latum of Sternberg's arrange- ment, and rendered particu- larly interesting in connection with the foUowing remarks. The tree-ferns, which consti- tute so beautiful a feature of the tropical regions, ex- hibit several characters, by wliich they may be com- pared with the ancient plants ; but as they nave been seen by comparatively few botanists, their structure is almost too little known to allow of their comparison with the vegetables dug up from our coal mines. Dr. Martins noticed one specimen in Brazil, so re- markable for the teaselated surface of its caudex, that he was not only struck by the novelty of the circum- stance, but, on comparing it and eight other species with figures in Count Stembei's work, he foimd them connected by so strong an affinity, as to enter- tain no doubts of their generic identity. This writer, in a paper* read before the Royal Botanical Society at Ratisbon, in 1824, describes thirteen species of f<[fdl filicites, respectively exhibiting on their surfaces those striking configurations which render them re- markable in the cabinets of the curious, and still characterise many plants growing in South America.

TnuuUted in Edin. Fhil. Jaum. xli, 53.

96 Organic Remains.

Fig. 6. [) utoni .iir.1 Fig- 6- repre-

sents a specimen of the Euphorbiies vtians of Artis, wliich has not, he

I says, been figured by any other au- thor, though found in the greater part of the coal fields of Europe, The cicatrices are flat, fish-shaped, the upper part trigonal ; glands two, which, when the bark is absent, appear aa twin tubercles on the ligneous fibres. These are a very strilung species of stems : that, from which Artis made his drawing, was nine feet long, five feet in cir- cumference at the lower extremity, and one foot nine inches at the upper. In one of the abandoned coal mines near Wentworth, seven trunks of this plant were suspended freely from the roof: some of them projected a foot, and the ki;est measured eight feet in circumference. In addition to various species of dgiUaria analogous to the above, there are several varieties common in collections, consisting of slabs fluted as uniformly as if wroiht with a carpenter's plane, and the ribs of which exhibit neither glands nor cicatrices. The writer of the article on coal, in " Rees' Cyclopasdia," mentions, that curious visitors used to be shewn, on the roof of a lateral opening in one of the Kenton pits, near Newcastle, a variety of specimens of edngular plants, somewhat like grasses, ferns, vetches, &c. imprinted upon a sort of blue slaty stone : the different plants are remarkably distinct from each other, lliere is also, in one part, the

Vertical And Prostrate Stems. 07

trunk of a tree, many blocks of which have been taken out, to make seats in a neighbouring garden. As far as the stone has been cut, the tree has been traced, even to its smallest branches ; and the rough- ness of the bark is still preserved in the stone : the whole of this stratum/' adds the writer, is one unin- terrupted continuation of these impressions of vege- taUes : it is nearly horizontal, and 112 yards from the surface.'

While the assemblages of the more delicate vege- table forms, which have left their impressions in certain strata, appear to have been heaped confusedly toge- ther, and while the stems of much larger tribes have been much compressed, and are mostly found lying in a position parallel to the enclosing stratum, diere is a third class of fossil trees, individuals of which are often found in nearly vertical attitudes, apparently standing where they have grown, their roots distinctly expanded in the lower beds, while, in some instances, the stem rises through several different strata. Num- bers of these sigUlarue have been observed in the High Main coal bed, as well as in other places. They are the casts — mostly in sand-stone— of plants lined and jointed in the manner of bamboos, and sometimes two or three feet in diameter. The stem found in Craigleith Quany, near Edinburgh, is forty, seven feet in length, the bark being converted into coal. Stems nearly as long, and four feet and a half in diameter, have sometimes occurred in the coal districts in the North of England.

An appropriate depository — the Mnseam of the Natural History Society, al Newcastle-upon-Tyne, is rich in splendid specimens of this and the other fossils ftom the circiuqjacent coal district There is, in the Moseum of the Philosophical Society at York, a remarkably fine siiUariOf presented by Lord Milton, in 1832, from the collieries of Earl FitzwilUam, near Rotherham.

H

gg ORGANIC REMAINS,

Ko. 1. represents, of the natural rize, the rhomboidal configniation, of a Ug% beautiful specimen of LeP"'"" denton. (Stembergii )in the M-

IphilosopWcal Society. Theentoem-

presdon i. about eight mches hj.

of polished coal, on a mass of dark

clay ironstone: it is accompomed

a fair, but less strilong, slah of iep-

' Obovatnm. Stemh. from the Elsecar

Colliery, near Rotherham, where n-y yerySne coal

nrr.'ttrnSbC-onoccur.

.bun Sly in the cod distric of W-' f rf YorksUre, and in Derbyshire : it has b" tnd on the top of Ingleborough, m the coal sttaof Northumberland, at Dudley in Shropsh, mjhe neighbourhood of Bristol, and m several P'' mh respect to the included or constttuent it seems alfay. to coincide with that of 'f' "j Uch it is embedded, with a shght modrficaUon of density: in a piece encrusted °" before the writer of this notice, the phytohthus itself consists almost entirely of iron pyrites, ajid is nerfy as ponderous SB metal. It is most abundant m the ne grained silicious stone, proyincially called ailhard or ganister, used for mending the roads, and often exhibiting films and encrustations of coal— this matto generally bkckening if not mvesting the fossil, which always occurs as a compressed cylinder, vaiying m diameter from three to twelve inches. The surfece is marked in quincuncial order with pustules, or rather depressed areolte, with a rising in the middle.

Ganister Fossils. 99

ill the centre of which rising a minute speck is often Tisible. Mr. Martin suspected that these pustules were the marks of the attachment of the penduncles of leaves : at all events, long tubular acini, fibres, or leaves, are sometimes to be seen proceeding from the areolae of the central cylinder in rajs through the stratum in every direction, to the distance, it is said, of twenty feet, tiiough the present writer could never trace them to that extent These remains belong to the genus stiffmaria-f of Brongniart, and characterise the lower or ganister coal series of Yorkshire. In making a large reservoir at Crooks-moor, near Shef- field, in 1833, thousands of tons of this stone were raised and carted away to mend the roads, during which time it was impossible to pass the heaps of broken matter without being struck by the prodigious numbers of the casts of these vegetables, and also with the profusion of long riband like leaves with which every piece of ganister appeafSed to be interlaced tfaronghont, and which, from the black or pied aspect

Steinhaoer on FowU ReliqniflB, p. S.

t Stigmaria Fieoide$ of Lindley and HuttoUt who hare -giren (Vot I.) worn* beautiful repmentatioiui of different stems of this class. These Au- thoxs are of opinion that the stigmaiia in question was a prostrate landplanty the blanches of which ndiated legolaxly from a common oentiey and flnallyy became forked : that it was dicotyledonous; of a succulent nature; and that the tubercles upon the stem are the places from which the leaves, which are apposed to ha?e been succulent and cylindrical have fkUen off. The pre- sent may be as farourable an opportunity as may occur to the present writer for expressing his admiration of the Fossil Flora" of Lindley and Button : so exquisite axe the illustrations, and so accurate and scienttfic the descrip- tions, that although Sternberg's splendid work will always be regarded as tho foundation of our knowledge on this subject, it will no longer be the reproach of our Oryctoloists, that the best, not to say only methodical description of our native fossils exists in the writings of a foreigner.

X In Phil. Mag. and Jounou for Not. 1832, p. 349, is an articl* on the above member of the Coal Series, by J. Phillips, Siq. of the YorfcAire Philosophical Society.

H 2

100 Organic Rebaiks.

ixfauj wl"c sometimes give it, bavepro-

crow-stone."

Fig. 8. is a nodule of bind, with the impresaion of some Terticillate plant, co- l pied from Martin;— it is probably one of the asterophyllites, much finer sped- mens of winch genus are sometimes met with.* Fi0, 9. is the pseudo royal filicite of the same au- thor, a species of Neun/pteris, single pinnse or leaflets of which in nodules of brown ironstone, are not uncommon N. giganleaf the fronds of which are supposed to have been several feet long, differs cbiefiy from the foregoing in having pointed leaflets some- what more distantly separated upon the midrib of each pinnate iKif. Vegetable impressions, as before remarked, are often met with in nodules of ironstone ; and we sometimes witness analogous re- sults in the occuirence of recent leaves very delicately preserved in those deposits of our ferruginous waters where ochre b formed : hence, as Dr. Darwin ob- served, the various ores of

" dusky iron Bleep dark abodes. And ferny foliage nestles in theii nodes."

One of Uiew, the attmphyUitn itmgifolia of Lindla; and Hutlon, Sgured in "Murmofa GeologlMl Fact* ajul Obwrraaons," u oocurtbig in the eod fidd of Adkby.de.l-Zouch; ihU work contalna one of the beat erlea of mcoanlel; drewn nd oolonred repreMataCioiiB of Ibe COal Tagetablaa which hu been publiihed in this country.

Impressions Uf Ferns. 101

nopteri$ crtnaia a species of fern deli- cately imprinted blue shale : it is one of the most pleasing objects of its class, and, with the forego- ing, delineated from beautiful q)ecimens now lying biBfore the writer of these pages. I. 11. represents small q>ecimens of three other vegetables occasionally met with Fig. n. citti.iw.] in strata juxtjosed

with the coal : a. a fem (Aleutopteris vulgatior, Sternberg) ; a. sujj- posed to belong to a i genns of plants, inter- P mediate between the equiseta and granmiK, ( VoUcmannia distachia, Stembei) ; c. small portion of a minute specimen of a handsome branching fem, (Neurop- terU gigantea, Brongn.) This is a vegetable of fre- quent occuirence in most coal fields, and, with both the others, is generally met with in bluiali indurated clay.

In consequence of the dictum of M. Adolphe Brongniart, expressed in a highly interesting essay on the natiure of the vegetation which covered the

103 Organic Remains.

sor&ce of the eaith at the Efferent epochs of the formation of its crost,* it had become, as it were a received law of nature, not to be disputed, that no phaenogamons vegetable existed daring the oldest of his epochs, no remains of such plant having been discovered in the first of his four formations, com- prising the numerous strata of grauwacke, encrinal limestone, and carboniferous rocks, magnesian lime- stone, and red sandstone. In contravention of the hypothesis as applying to the first of the above periods, Mr. Wynch has remarked,f that it is a well known fact in the neighbourhood of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, that the large trunks of trees found mineralized in the sandstone strata of that district, are branched in the same way as our forest timber, and must, of course, have belonged to the dicotyledonous subdivi- sion of plants. Odier evidence corroborative of this opinion has been produced.

It is, however, to H. T. M. Witham, of Lartington, that geologists are indebted for the means of a more extended insight into the structure of vegetable or- ganic remains, than those commonly possessed. This gentleman suggested, and first practised with sin- gular success, the method of cutting from fossil steins transversely and longitudinally thin slices, and having cemented them to pieces of glass, polished them so as to render the internal structure strikingly conspicuous under the microscope. The results of an ample series of experiments, undertaken with the view of developing any traces which the lapidifying and carbonizing processes may have spared in such remains of the ancient Flora of our globe, as are com- monly met with, have been published by Mr. Witham,

Trmnriated in Edin. Phil. Joum. vi. 349, &c. f Mag. Nat. Hist. Ui. 373.

Primeval Vegetable Forms. 103

in an interesting volume, iUustrated by exquisitely engrayed specimens of skeleton structure.*

It is well known to botanists, that the stems of monocotyledonous vegetables present a system of sap vessels and fibres widely different from tliat of the dicotyledonous tribes ; the fonner being exemplified by the internal structure of grasses, reeds, &c.; the latter, by the more solid texture of our larger trees. Such being the physiological fact, it has been a favourite theoiy with certain continental geologists to assume that, judging from the remains, every deposit, from the oldest to the most recent strata, exhibits a pnpressive developement of vegetable and animal forms, firom the simplest to the most complex* Brongniart is the original propounder of this hypo, thesis which is opposed by Mr. Lyell, Lindley and Hutton, as well as others, on satisfactory grounds; and however plausible the idea, it appears to be fast giving way before the investigations to which the method of the assiduous analyst above named has given rise.

'From what has already been done," says Mn Witham, we are led to believe that the surfaces of the earth, as they successively existed, were adorned in those remote periods, with trees containing woody cellular tissue, difiering entirely fix>m that presented by the vascular ciyptogamic plants, such as the Equi* setaceae, Lycopodiaceae, and Filices.'*

Our author willingly admits that, at the period of the deposition of the mountain limestone and coal series, ''there existed Equisetaceae ten feet high,

The Internal Stractare of Fossil Vegetables found in the Carboniferons and Oolitic Deposits of Great Britain Described and lUastra/' 4to. with plates, 1833.

104 Organic Remains.

monocotjledonous plants and tree-ferns from fifty to sixty feet high, and arborescent Lycopodiaceae from sixty to seventy feet high ; but I must," he adds, " contend, that there also existed coniferous trees, or such as contained a complicated woody structure, in gi*eat abundance, and many of tiiem of a height equal to the loftiest of those just mentioned. That the preponderance of vascular cryptogamic plants was considerable, I do not wish to question. Many of the shale strata accompanying the combustible beds of the coal-fields, contain innumerable impressions of Pilices, Equisetaceae, and Lycopodiaceae ; but that the beds, particularly at the bottom of the coal fields, also contain numberless specimens of gymnospermous phanerogamic plants, or of trees analagous to them, is now established beyond dispute. From the frequent occurrence, therefore, of trees possessing an exogenous structure, I cannot help suspectitig the correctness of the assertion, tliat, 'the class wliich almost of itself composed the Flora of this period, is that of the vascular cryptogamic plants, and, in fact, that of two hundred and sixty species discovered in this formation, two hundred and twenty belong to that class.*

Proceeding to particulars, Mr. Witham mentions that vegetable fossils, evidently analagous to the tribe of pines, if not identical with the true conifer®, have been found in the quarry of Craigleith, near Edinburgh, where some of the stems measured be- tween forty and fifty feet in length, with a diameter, at their widest part, of at least five feet. Also, at Lennel Braes and Allen Bank, in Berwickshire ; in several places about Newcastle-upon-Tyne; and

Fossil Vegetables, p. 6.

Calamites Steinhaueri. 105

especially about five miles west of the city of Durham fosafl plants are described as found and resembling the Coniferae. If, therefore/' concludes Mr. Witham, " the aiument that the combustible beds of our coal-fields are composed of vascular cryptogamic plants, rests upon the numerous impressions of the scattered remains of the leaves and stems of that class, why should the many magnificent members of the phanerogamic class be allowed to lie speechless in their early graves, instead of proclaiming the an- tiquity of their origin, and the usefulness of their remains ?"'

Mr. Steinhauer has described under the appellation Figj2. of PhyloUthus stdcatus, (fig. 12.)

an interesting fossil of the coal form- ation, apparently either the terminal apex or first rudiment of one of the Bambusis, whose striated stems are so abundant. The cast, either de- tached or embedded in the matrix, and composed of sand, or of the argillaceous carbonate of iron, occurs of various sizes, from one inch to several inches in diameter, and occa sionally somewhat differing in form. Some persons, especially those who are disposed to regard as of the cacti family, those immense stems which are covered with pustular risings or depres- sions, have not scrupled to pronounce these fossils to have been flower-buds, resembling those of the recent cojcIus speciasissma ! This seems a piirely fanciful hypothesis. A friend informed Mr. Steinhauer, that these casts very greatly resembled the appearance of the Surinam bamboo, immediately on its rising above

106 Organic Remains.

ground. On the other hand, Lindley and Hutton appear to consider them rather as the base or bottom of the stem whence the roots proceeded. Brongniart has appropriately named this fossil Calamites Stem- haueri, in commemoration of its original describer, an excellent man and ingenious Oiyctologist

The existence of antholithes, or fossilized flowers has been generally doubted, on the ground that the succulent substance of the stamens and pistils must be too delicate to undeigo the lapidifying or car- bonising process: but there exist impressions on shale and sandstone in the British Museum, on viewing which it is difficult to resist the conviction that they exhibit some kind of stellate blossoms. That casts of seeds, ears of wheat, barley, or other of the cereal grasses occur in the true coal formation, has also been denied. Seeds, however, do sometimes occur — but probably in no instance com, notwith- standing the specious appearance of certain impres- sions to the contrary : indeed, it is asserted, that no trace of any glumaceous plant has been met with, even in the latest tertiary rocks, although we know that grasses now form a portion, and usually a very consi- derable one, of every Flora of the world, from New South Shetland to Melville Island inclusive.

The remains of the animal kingdom found in the coal and associate beds are less striking than those of vegetable origin. Fossil fishes have been dis- covered in the carboniferous group, as well in Scot- land as in this country — specimens from the coal in the neighbourhoods of Leeds and Newcastle being preserved in the Museums of both those towns. The large remains found in the ironstone of Wardie, and

Fossil Flora, I. siil

Animals In Coal Strata. 107

in the coal fields of Greenside and Glasgow, and which were at first considered to be remains of saurian animals, are now determined bj M. Agassiz and other Ichthyologists, to be true fishes.

About the middle of the coal series in Derbyshire, or in the ninth bed of shale, reckoning in the ascend- ing order, a stratum of ironstone occurs, which is so fon of different species of Mjtili, &c. as to be dis- tinguished by the name of the muscle hand.'' There hare been instances mentioned by various authorities of living toads found incarcerated in the coal strata : the fact of there ever having been in reality any such discoveries, is denied by Professor Buckland, who attributes the reports to mistakes on the part of pit- men, who having met with the animals in their work- ings, imagined them to have been dug out of the coal, without considering that they might but recently have entered the shaft. However this be, and the supposition is more facile than sound, the learned

In the brown cofel formation, which belongs to a more recent geological era than the tnie caiboniferons gnmp, animal remaina are freqaentlj foimd, especially in the lignitic depoeitB of the European continent. Mr. Ljell mentions that many entire Jaws and other bones of an extinct mammifer, called by CuTier Anthracotherlam, hare been found in the coal beds of Cadibone, the bone being itwlf changed into a kind of coal. In these beds, howeyer, although comprising carbonaceous shales, and several seams of coal from two to six feet in thickness, no shells have been discovered, nor im- pressions of plants of which the species can be determined. The same au- thority also informs us, that near the valley of the Rhine, a tertiary forma- tion, called brown coal, fhnn the associadon with it of beds of lignite worked for fuel, contains various organic remains, particularly fishes and frogs : ihey are found in a bituminous shale, called paper coal, from being divisible into extremely thin leaves. It may be mentioned here, as an interesting dlstlne- tion of the two groups, that while the vegetable matter whlsh has been changed into the common coal, was until recently considered to have belonged exclusively to monocotyledonous plants of extinct species, all the distinguish- able xemaina of plants in the lignite and associated beds are asld to belong to dicotyledonous trees and shrubs, bearing a close resemUance to those now existing in the country.

108 Organic Remains.

Professor's experiment shewing that toads died when confined without air or food in closely glazed stone cells, no more disproves the repeatedly alleged dis- covery of live toads in coal, than it does their ex- traction from hlocks of marble, of which latter fact, at least, there does not appear to be any reasonable doubt.*

In concluding this chapter, it may be interesting to mention that, at the beginning of 1833, some "Ob- servations on Coal" were read before the Philoso- phical Society of Newcastle, by W. Hutton, Esq., from which it appeared that, on examining with the microscope one of those slices of coal in which Mr. Witham had discovered a distinct vegetable texture, the attention of the Author was excited by the re- markable appearance of several cells in that part of the coal where the texture of the original plant could not be distinguished. The coal of the New- castie district is considered by the Author to be of three kinds : the first, . which is the greatest in quan- tity and the best in quality, is the neb. caking coal so generally esteemed ; the second is cannel or parrot coal, or splent coal of the miners ; and the third, the slate coal of Jameson, which consists of the two former, arranged in thin alternate layers, and has conse-

*The occnrrence of living toads embedded, or rather entombed, in cavities of the deep strata has been adduced as a striking objection to the igneous theory of Hutton, and of course, as an equally striking testimony in Mtoqt of the hypothesis of aqueous solution, which commonly bears the name of Werner. Mr. Murray, the chemist, has remarked, that the lethargy of the toad and lizard may continue without the extinction of life for ages ; and both these animals have been found embedded in stone : " a toad," says this author, 'was found under the coal seam, in the ironstone over which it rested, in coal mine at AuchincruiTe, in Ayrshire.'* Toads have often been buried in garden poU, and found alive after long intervals. Mr. Jesse mentions an instance of a toad so buried, which at the end of twenty years was taken up much increased in bulk.

Cellular Texture In Coal. 109

quentlj a slaty stracture. In these varieties of coal, more or less of the vegetable texture could always be discovered: thus affording the fuUest evidence, if any snch proof were wanting, of the vegetable origin of coal. Each of the three kinds of coal, besides the fine distinct reticulation of the original vegetable tex- ture, exhibits other cells, filled with a light wine- yellow coloured matter, apparently of a bituminous nature, and so volatile as to be entirely expeUed by heat before any change is effected in the other con- stituents of the coal. The number and appearance of these cells vaiy with each variety of coal : in the finest portions, where the crystalline structure, as in- dicated by the rhomboidal form of its fragments, is most developed, the cells are completely obliterated : the texture being uniform and compact, and the whde arrangement indicating a more perfect union of the constituents, and a more entire destruction of the ori- ginal texture of the plant. After describing these cells, and illustrating them by drawings, Mr. Hutton proceeds to speculate on their origin in the cannel coal : he considers it highly probable that they are derived from the reticular texture of the parent vege- table, rounded and confused by enormous pressure : moreover, that though the perfectly and imperfectly developed varities of coal generally occiur in distinct strata, yet it is easy to find specimens which in the compass of a single square inch contain both varieties. From this fact, as also firom similarity of position in the mine, the difference in the different varieties of eosl are ascribed to original difference in the plants firom which they were derived.*

London and Edinborgh Phil. Mag., April, 1833.

Chapter Vi.

The Coal Formation.

Review of the arrangement of carboniferous strata, as forming coalfields, coal basins, and coal measures — ArrowsmitKs mip of the coal districts-Somerset- shire coal field— Smith Gloucestershire or Bristol coal field— Forest of Dean— South Welsh coal field— Shropshire fieldr—Smth Staffordshire and Wafckshire— North Staffordshire— North Wales —Lancashire coal field— Yorkshire, Nottingham- shire, and Derbyshire coal fields — Whitehaven coal jleld — Northumberland and Durham — Unexplored localities in England— Scotch coalfields — Ayrshire — Paisley — Lanarkshire — East Lothian — Cuirass —Irish coal fields— Districts of Leinster, Munster, Connaught, and Ulster — Description of a coal basin — Somersetshire and South Welsh basins — Mantle, and inverted basin shapes — Swilleys or small basins.

W E have already adverted to the geological posi- tion of the carbonijferoas group of strata (vide p. 36) where it will also be seen that the terms used at the head of the present chapter are applied to one of those five general classes or suits, into which the

ARRANGEMENT OP COAL STRATA. Ill

whole known series of nuBeral beds may be compre-

hensively resolved. The class of rocks here alluded

to, and to which, for distinction's sake, the name of

medial has heen applied range downward from the

class terminating, as the case may be, with what

geologists term the upper or newer red sandstone,

conglomerate or magnesian limestone, and contain

not only the great coal deposit, but likewise the older

limestone, or as it is sometimes designated from the

organic remains embedded in it— encrinal limestone,

and the red sandstone, on which it reposes. It

may be remarked that the immense and diversified

series of strata upwards, from the old red sandstone,

constitute the region of vegetable remains, and to a

great extent of the metalliferous deposits also.

It is not, however, intended to mould the matter of the present Chapter into any systematic form, nor to make it the vehicle of any .particular theory : the terms Coal Formation,*' may, therefore, conve- niently be used to designate : —

I. Those generally insulated tracts of carboniferous strata, commonly known in this country under the appellation of '' coal fields.''

II. The scope and inclination of the strata, deno- minated fix>m their flexures, and occasional spherical formation, coal basins ;" and

III. The succession and order of strata, as dis-

It l8 an inteimting fact m connected with geological enquiries, that these depoiitions are not always found confonnable with the underlying meiwifiii as to parallelism of their sorfaces. In some sitoations, the newer red sandstone fills np the superior inequalities of the snbjacent strata, as if the aaatter which afterwards consolidated into the stone abore named had, in the fint instance, flowed over the prerioosly contorted mountain limestone and coal measores, no disturbing force having subsequently been exerted to preyent the trsnquil settlement and aggregation of the conglomentte.

112 The Coal Formation.

played in a vertical section, and called coal

measures."

Of these three views of the coal formation, it may perhaps be remarked in addition, that the first is that which chiefly interests the topographer ; the second / the geologist ; and, the third, the miner.

Te map, engraved by Arrowsmith to accompany the Report of the Coal Trade, printed by order of the House of Commons, in 1 830, shews in a striking if not very precise manner, the geological position as well as the commercial distribution of the coal of England and Wales. But it must be recollected that in computing from the coloured areas on this map, the entire space is often erroneously taken as underlaid with coal ; for in most of the large fields there axe extensive tracts of barren or unascertained strata: this being the case, the districts afterwards described are rather given as those within which coal occurs, than as .being entirely occupied by it. If, however, a person take an ordinary map of this portion of Great Britain, and draw a line firom Wey- mouth, on the English Channel, to Jedburgh, on the Scottish Border, and then draw at right angles with that line, other lines, as follow: — 1, on the west side, from St. Bride's Bay to Pontypool j 2, on the east, firom Wolverhampton to Atherstone j 3, on the east, firom Newcastle-under-Lyne to Cheadle j 4, on the west, fi*om Chester to Mold ; 5, on the east, fi*om Huddersfield to Pontefi:act; 6, on the west, fix)m Whitehaven to Appleby; — such lines will intersect nearly every portion of coal district in England and Wales. It may be further remarked that, if another line, parallel with the former be drawn, from Gosport on the south to Guisebrough on the north side of the

Coal Fields. 113

island, almost ereiy portion of the trae coal formation known to exist in Britain, will be fonnd to lie on the western side of such line.

In describing these localities somewhat more in detail, we shall proceed from south to north ; and in 'this course, about eighteen miles from Bath, we ap- proach a curved tract, stretching perhaps twelve miles in length, and being about three miles over in the widest part ; this is the Somersetshire coal field. Proceeding onwards, we immediately come to the South Gloucestershire, or Bristol field : it lies to the east of the city just named, and may be said to be about a dozen ndles in length, extending from the Avon northward, and three miles in average breadth. This is the nearest place to London at which coal has been found : and here, the strata dipping east- ward, pass beneath the red marl. Assuming that the Somersetshire coal measures, continuing to dip at the rate they do at Bristol, ultimately pass under the Metropolis, where wells have been sunk to the depth of 130 feet before reaching the sand, Mr. Phillips supposesf that the strata of coal are more than two miles beneath the bottom of the clay'* underlying

The coal fonnation in this coiAtry, lies generally in sitiuttions con* Tenlently aoeesriUe : and alihoagli Chis is not exactly the case in other parts of the world — partioQlarly in America, there is still much of truth in the speculation, which assames that the rich and pleasant Talleys, and low plains near the seas, and large xiTers, were to he the habitations of the sodal and oomnMrcial, busy world of manldnd ; and there the coals are fonnd, perlectly eonrenient for home consomption, and for snpplylng the wants of others, bj the great commercial high roads — the waters. Had the coals been deposited in the bowels of the highest mountains, they would in a great measure haTO been useless to society, manufactures, and commerce. We could not con* Teniently hare carried the coals from the distant mountains nor hare lived near them. The high mountains anp too barren, too cold, and too far from the seas, for the residence of man in a social, commercial state but there is none, or rery little of them there.

t Geology, 219.

114 The Coal Formation.

London. The hypothesis, however, upon which Uiis vast eccentric dip and direction are calculated is justly regarded as untenable.

The next coal field is that of the Forest of Dean ; it is somewhat of an oval form ; the average diameter, six or seven miles. Directly west, of tlie last men- tioned deposit, and at a distance of less tbaa twenty miles, lies the great South Welsh coal field, ex- tending firom Pontypool on the east, to St Bride's Bay on die West side of the Principality, and in- cluding the great iroti works of Merthyr Tydvil Mr. Martin, who has published a very exact survey of this formation, states its length to be upwards of one hundred miles ; and the average breadtii, in the counties of Monmouth, Glamorgan, Carmarthen, and part of Brecon, firom eighteen to twenty miles, and in Pembrokeshire only firom three to five miles : tlie broader and narrower portions are separated by Car- marthen Bay, which is about twelve miles across, taking the line of the coal field.

Returning to the line first drawn, and still pro- ceeding northward, we next come to the Shropshire field, including Coalbrook Dale, and the Plain of Shrewsbury : these taken together, may make eighty or ninety miles of coal. North-east of the last tract, lies what may be called the South Staffordshire, or Dudley and Warwickshire field. The first basin of this coal, occupies a space between the towns of Stourbridge, Birmingham, Wolverhampton, and Walsal; and extending in a triangular form on a base line drawn between the two last named places, the hypotheneuse lying about midway between Lich- field and Penkridge ; and comprising altogether an

Phil. Trans.

Coal Fields. 115

area of seventy or eighty square rnOes. The second basin occurs ten miles east of the preceding, and extends from Tamworth to Coventry, twenty miles ; the average breadth being about three miles. Be- sides the foregoing, there are coal measures, north- east and south-west of the town of Ashby-de-la- Zonch, maMng together, at least thirty square miles f.

What is called the North Staffordshire, or Pottery coal field, consists of two sections, the eastward of which, surrounding Cheadle, and the westward in- cluding Burslem, may be said together to spread over about sixty square miles. Some authorities, however, have estimated the area of the field as com- prising from 40 to 50,000 acres of thick coal.

The North Wales, or Flintshire field, thirty miles west of the last-mentioned, comprises, 1, a tract ex- tending from Wrexham to Hawarden, and thence, along the south-west bank of the river Dee, to the Irish sea : 2, a small section, stretching from Oswes- try towards Shrewsbury j 3, a basin lying between the two preceding ; and, 4, in the Isle of Anglesey ; spreading together over at least one hundred and fifty miles.

The great Lancashire coal field, stretching from Manchester to Colne toward the north, and from the former place to Liverpool toward the west, is of an exceedingly irregular form, and running out into vast branches, one of which extends from Ashton-

Mananet, after describing the range of the outcrop of the Ashby coal field, estimates the included area at not less than from 35 to 40,000 sqaare acres.

f The collieries on the Wolds near Ashbj-de-la-Zouch, are vorlced on an eztensiT'e scale by the Marquis of Hastings, and also by some priyate indi- Tidaals. The depth of the pits is mostly from 300 to 300 yards.

116 The Coal Formation.

under-Line to Macclesfield. Prom the zigzags cha- racter of the outline of this field on ArrowsmitJi's map, it is difficult to compute the area of the whole : it cannot, however, be less than from four to five hundred mUes, including an insulated portion at Hornby, near Lancaster.

Eastward of the above, lie the important coal fields of Yorkshire, Nottingham, and Derbyshire, so called, as extending into those counties, but constituting one continuous extent of formation, stretching in length from Nottingham to Bradford, a distance of upwards of sixty miles in a straight line, and being on the average hardly less than eighteen miles in breadth.

The Whitehaven coal field stretches along the eastern shore of the Irish sea, from beyond Egremont to Maryport, where it sweeps inland to Hesket, form- ing an arc with a chord of about thirty miles : the average width about four miles.

We next come to the great northern coal field, extending into the counties of Durham and North- umberland, and containing those immense deposits of excellent coal, firom which not only the metropolis, but a vast circuit of towns and villages on the coast fi-om Berwick to Plymouth, are supplied with this species of fiiel. In pursuing our prescribed course northward, we enter upon the southern extremity of this coal field a little beyond the Tees, at a place called Staindrop ; proceeding over it, nearly in the middle, we pass through Durham,* Chester-le-street,

"The coUiery, or rather the three coUieries in the neighbourhood of Hetton, m the county of Durham, is at present says Mr. Wynch, the are iidiT" mining concern in this [the northern] coal field. These piU of coaU Min working two hundred thousand NewcasUe chaldrons the soath wert sStaated about seren mUes from Sunderland, to which here covaaI through the magnesian limestone, vers the coal measures, and is twenty-six fathoms in thickness.

Coal Fields. 117

Newcastle, Morpeth, and reach the opposite margin at Warkworih, on the Utile river Coquet, a distance of nearly sixty miles. Passing over an interval tract of about three miles, we again come at the coal, and pass over it through Alnwick and Belford towards Berwick, a distance of twenty-five miles, making in the whole an extent of coal field running for about eighty miles in one direction. From Berwick-on- Tweed to the estuary of the Tyne below South Shields, the coal extends along the coast-line, dipping, indeed, under the German Ocean. The figure of this im* mense coal field is very irregar : but the extent in a cross direction would be nearly passed over by taking the line of the Roman wall, which commences near North Shields, and proceeding in a westerly direction to Brampton, near Carlisle. The whole area of this district, as thus including the coal formation, lying under what is called at Newcastle the west coun- try," as well as the more important measures sur- roundiug that town, cannot be under fifteen hundred square miles.

It is not by any means pretended that the forego- ing are precisely accurate definitions of the outlines, much less exact computations of the size of the vari- ous coal fields named; but merely, as before explained, loose sketches, derived from the delineations on Ar- rowsmith's map, and serving at once to shew the topographical bearings and proportions of the several districts, and, at the same time, to indicate how ex- tensive are the depositories of this valuable mineral in this island. Besides the tracts above indicated, there are various unexplored localities, which future research may add to our present coal fields : a highl}' interesting memoir on this subject, by the Rev. W.

118 The Coal Formation.

Conybeore, is printed in the Philosopliical Magazine for 1834.

Scotland contains some highly important coal fields, though occupying a comparatively insulated district ; there being at least seventeen counties either desti- tute of coal, or containing it only in such small quan- tities, or of such indifferent quality, as to be of little value. To these may be added, the Orkneys, the Shetland Isles, and even the Hebrides, though the latter contain traces of seams. Generally speaking, the coal strata are not found north of Saltcoates, or south of Girvan in Ayrshire, on the west coast j nor north of St. Andrews, (except an inferior kind in Sutherlandshire,) or south of Berwick, on the east coast ; so that these four points may be said to define the coal country in Scotland, stretching firom S. W. to N. E. across the island, in breadth between thirty and forty miles f . In some districts the produce is very abundant : the whole of the south side of the county of Fife abounds in coal j there are productive collieries at Saltcoates in Ayrshire, and in the vici- nity of Paisley in Renfrewshire. Lanarkshire is fa- mous for an immense field of coal, imderlying a tract of limestone, iron ore, and freestone. East Lothian, one of the most fertile counties in Scotland, which rests, for the most part, upon a bed of granite, also

It has elsewhere been intimated, that besides the true, or as it has been called the " Independent" coal formation, seams of an indifferent and appa- rently newer kind are sometimes worked above the magnesian limeatone. As an exception to the generally limited size of the deposits of this npper coal, may be mentioned that of Brora, in Satherlandshire, alluded to in the text, and which stretches for several miles along the coast of Scotland. This deposit in which extensive workings have at one time or other been pursued during the last three centuries, is believed to correspond in geological position with the carbonaceous series of East Yorkshire, described by Mr. Phillips, as occurring between the lower oolitic and the combrash limestones.

f Playfair's ScoUand, vol. i. p. 174.

1"

J

Scotch And Irish Coal Fields. 119

affords abandance of excellent pit-coal : three consi- derable collieries are worked in the parish of Tra- nent, seven nules west of Haddington, the chief town of this county. Campsie, Baldemock, Kilsyth, and Larbert, are situated on the great Lanarkshire coal field, from which the celebrated iron-works on the riyer Carron are supplied with fuel ; nearly 200 tons of coal per day were consumed at these works some years ago. At Culross, a detached comer of the county of Perth, coal has been wrought for ages : these works, as they are among the most ancient, were also, at one time, the most considerable in Scot- land ; and an Act of Parliament, a.d. 1663, ordained that the Culross chalder should be the standard mea sure for the kingdom.

The following summary of the Irish coal fields is extracted from Mr. Griffitib's admirable report on the Leinster coal district, and quoted by Conybeare and Phillips.* Coal has been discovered in more or less quantity in the following seyenteen counties of Ire- land : — Antrim, near Ballycastle ; Donegal, north of Mount Charles ; Tyrone, in the Ulster coal district, and at Drumquin ; Fermanagh, a north continuation of the Connaught coal district, and at Petigoe; Monaghan, near Carrickmacross ; Cavan, near Bel- tufbet ; Leitrim, and Roscommon in the Connaught coal district j Westmeath, near Athlone; Queen's County, Kilkenny, and Carlow, in the Leinster coal district ; Tipperaiy, continuation of the same ; and Clare, Limerick, Kerry, and Cork, in the Munster coal district. Of the four principal coal districts into which the island may be divided, \iz., the Leinster, the Munster, the Connaught, and the

Introd. Geology, part i. p. 462.

120 The Coal Formation.

Ulster, — the two former contain carbonaceous or stone coal — the slaty glance*' coal of Werner ; and the latter bituminous or blazing coal.

The Leinster coal district b situated in the counties of Kilkenny, Queen's County, and county of Carlow. It also extends a short distance into the county of Tipperary, as far as Killenaule. This is the prin- cipal carbonaceous coal district. It is divided into three detached parts, separated from each other by a secondary limestone country, which not only enve- lopes, but in continuation passes under the whole of the coal district.

The Munster coal district, occupies a considerable portion of the counties of Limerick and Kerry, and a large part of the county of Cork. It is by much the most extensive in Ireland; and in the neigh- bourhood of Kanturk, in the county of Cork, coal and culm have been raised for about a century. The formation itself is referable to one of the earliest periods at which the former mineral has been pro- duced, the true coal overlying the mountain lime- stone.* At Dromagh colliery, Mr. Griffiths was in- formed, the work had been carried to a considerable extent, and that the annual supplies of coal and culm materially contributed to the agricultural improve- ment of an immense extent of the great maritime and commercial counties of Cork and Limerick, which otherwise must have continued neglected and unreclaimed. In addition to setting forth the interest and importance of the tract just mentioned, the writer of the report entertained a hope that the time was not remote, when the great coal field on the left bank

Wearer on the Geological relations of the South of Ireland in Jame- son's Edifi, Journ. Oct, 18d0.

Irish Coal Fields. 121

of the Black Water would be found to contain mine- ral treasure altogether inexhaustible.

The Connaught coal district stands next in order of value and importance, to those of Leinster and Munster, and possiblj may be found to deserve the first place when its subterranean treasures shall be explored. At present little is known beyond the fact, that the outer edges of several beds of coal have been observed, but they have not been traced to any distance; so that their extent has not been ascertained. The coal is of the bituminous species, particularly adapted to the purposes of iron-works ; and the grey pig-metal made at the Arigna iron-works is reckoned among the best smelted in the empire.

The Ulster coal district is of trifling importance when compared with the foregoing. It commences near Dungannon, in the county of Tyrone, and ex- tends, in a northern direction, to Coal Island, and in continuation to the neighbourhood of Cookstown. No beds of coal worth working have hitherto been discovered between Coal Island and Cookstown, but certainly the strata extend there. The principal coL lieries are at Coal Island and Dungannon, adjacent to the great basaltic area which characterises this portion of Ireland; the coal measures themselves being supposed to be identical with those that belong to the formations of the great central valley of Scotland. The coal of this district is bituminous.

Besides the foregoing principal coal districts, there are others of less consequence. Bituminous coal has been found in the neighbourhood of Belturbet, in the county of Cavan, and at the collieries of Ballycastle, in the county of Antrim ; but the Antrim coal dis- trict is not very extensive, though the collieries have

122 The Coal Formation.

been wrought for a number of years. The coal is of a slaty nature and greatly resembles both the coal and the accompanying rocks which occur in Ayrshire, and probably they belong to the same formation. The whole of the coal districts of Ireland, so £u- as Mr. Griffiths was aware, are those above mentioned ; trials have, however, been made at Slane, on the river Boync, and also in the neighbourhood of Balbriggan and Rush. These trials were, however, on tlie edge of the district. Although coal is of very rare occur- rence, as well as of indifferent quality, in the county of Clare, Mr. Weaver suggests the probability of discovering valuable seams in the elevated regions of Mount Cullun, where, if coal should be found, the beds being nearly horizontal, it might be worked with advantage. From the foregoing account of the coal districts, it appears that very extensive tracts of coal country exist in Ireland ; but none, if we except the Leinster district, have been examined ; yet the Mun- ster coal district is in extent greater than any in Eng- land, and may probably contain inexhaustible beds of coal.

We have already stated, towards the beginning of this chapter, that these immense mineral deposits are often, with reference to their internal figure, denomi- nated by geologists coal basins. Recollecting that the beds or seams contained in a coal field, are not merely tabular masses, which lie evenly between their bounding planes, like a slab of marble, but in general, strata conforming successively to the scope of the hollow in which they are accumulated, it wiU be perceived that the edge or bounding line of each stratum must present itself at the surface, where denuded of the soil, appearing somewhat like the

Coal Basins. 123

concentric layers of an onion when cut in two : the edges of the coal and alternating beds being, how- ever, much less uniform in thickness and level. This '' coming to the day/' or appearance of the coal at the surface of the ground, is called by miners, the basset or outcrop, and serves, where it is exposed, to determine the form or size of the basin outwardly. These basins are generally elliptical, sometimes nearly circular, but are often very eccentric, being much greater in length than in breadth, and frequentiy tiie one side of tiie basin upon the narrow diameter, having a much greater dip than the other; which circumstance throws the trough or lower part of the basin much nearer to one side than the other.* From this view of an entire basin-shape, it is evident, that the dip is in every direction, and all the strata regularly crop out, and meet the alluvial cover in every point.

The most complete and simple form of a coal field, with reference to its section, is the entire basin shape, which we have in some instances, without a dislocation. A beautiful example of this as seen at

Seme recent geological writers have doubted the propriety of the term basiii,'' as generally applied to the coal and other depositB, on the ground that the containing area is much too rarely of any entire and regular figure to jus. tify the appellation. The immense hollows in which the carboniferous strata are commonly found accumulated, are supposed to have been lakes or ralleysy into which, as mentioned in a preceding chapter, hare been swept, under whaterer circumstances, the gigantic vegetables originally growing in their ridnity. The celebrated rale of Clyde, in the county of Lanark — the most lamouB Scotch coal country, is partly an immense basin, or rather trough, as the raeatfuies underlying the rirer, basset along both sides at a consider- able distance. And we recollect, on one occasion, to have heard the appella- tion of coal basin,'* given to the bed of the German Ocean, on the ground that the carboniiiarous strata which dip eastwardly near the coast below Newcastle, are the same that are found descending in a contrary direction on the oppodte shores of Belgium. It has been supposed that rich coal measures may pass under the British Channel.

The Coal Formation.

Kg. 18.

Blairengome in the county of Perth immediately adjoining the western bonndary of Clackmannanshire, accompanies the obsrations of Robert Bald, Esq.

on the coal field of the last named dis- trict. iTifig. 13. the elliptical line marked A B c D represents the crop or outburst of the lower coal, and the inner elliptical line the crop or bas- set of the upper coal : the converging darts indicating the dip the measures towards the centre. Fig. 14. is a longitudinal sec- tion of the line a b ; wAfig. 16. the transverse section of the line en; all the accompanying coal strata partake of same form and parallelism.

The annexed cut, fig. 16., shews a section, by the Kg. le.

P B

Kg. 15.

Rev. W. Conybeare, of a basin belonging to the Somersetshire and South Gloucestershire coal fields. It extends from the Mendip hills, indicated by the

Memoirs of Wemerian Society, toI. iii. p. 123. The oommanicttion of Mr. Bald has (Vumished many of the remarks in the text abore.

South Welsh Basin. 125

elevation at A, to the Wick rocks b ; the great masses of both being old red sandstone. The stronger black lines shew the coal measures, and the others, tibe strata with which they alternate — the lowest consist- ing of mountain limestone ; the next, millstone grit : the dotted portion is Pennant giit rock, the indenta- tion c at the right hand being a section of the bed gS the river Avon which bisects the basin in the direc- tion of its shorter diameter into nearly equal parts. Above the higher lines of coal, the first horizontal stratum e consists of new red sandstone, upon which repose beds of what geologists call lias F: the middle portion here underlying the bifurcate section of Dundry hill D, consisting of oolite : both these last named accumulations are species of limestone, containing vast quantities of marine shells. The summit of Dundry hill is 700 feet above the level of the sea. It would be easy to give outlines and sections of various other basins in the British coal fields; but these, however interesting to the geologist, would afford but littie gratification to the general reader, as they only differ in size and arrangement, and not in character, from those already noticed.

The great South Welsh coal field, comprising an area of upwards of nine hundred miles, and being, as some one has remarked, in the form of a long- necked flask, was long supposed to exhibit a nearly perfect basin. Later examination, however, has

Tke earliest writer who appears to have entertained any thing like a distinct idea of the arrangement and order of (he ooal strata, was Oeoige Owen, who, in 1570, left in manuscript a History of Pembrokethire. He, however, seems to have been nnaware of the snbtemmeons continuation of those beds, the superior outline of which he traced to a considerable distance, and which he improperly designates yeins. " It is not, indeed, uncommon to find miners among the Welsh collieries, generally speaking, a very intel- ligent race of men, who hare not yet become conTerts to Mr. Martin's idea

The Coal Formation.

enabled Mr. Conybeare to give the sabjoined sec- tion wbichy instead of being nearly hemisphaical.

ng,n.

as Mr. Martin had assumed, presents a rising of the measures on each side oi the anticlinal axis a, 17. It is from the basin shape, that all other coal fields are supposed to be formed, which are portions or seg- ments of a basin, or cavity of some kind, and have been produced by slips, dykes, or dislocations : these will form the subject of a separate Chapter. It may be here remarked, however, that the strata in many situations, instead of shelving generally from all parts of the superior circumference to the centre, or, as miners call it, the tnmgh of the basin, sometimes occupy a vice-versa position, rising from the sides to the summit, and, as it were, overlying a cone within : in this case, the formation is said to be mantle-shaped ; or when the cone pierces the strata, and the crop appears, indicating divergency downward, this form of the coal measures is termed the inverted basin. These peculiar conformations, however, comparatively seldom occur : examples are to be seen in Scotland in the county of Fife, and in several districts of En- gland J but even in extensive coal fields, the inverted basin-form is only a partial occurrence, or a devia tion from what is conceived to be the general and ordinary form. Through the hill upon which Dudley

of a Minofal Butin : to the sune oanie may probably be attributed the ierm wy%% or veiny nnlTonaUy given by the Welsh miners to a seam orbed of coal."

Inyeeted Basin Shape. 127

Castle is built, canals hare bei cut for woiking the great beds of limestone : these beds occur in the lower series of the strata of the Staffordshire coal field, and, of course, are to be found at many miles distance firom the Castle hill, and beyond the crop and ondmrsts of all the workable coal in the true basin-shaped part of the field; at the same time, by this invested basin-form, these beds of limestone are elerated tax above the level of the common sur&ce of the country, and consequCTilly above the level of all the coaLs. The numerous beds of coal, one of which is of the very great thickness of thirty feet, lie next the Castle hill, in a conforming situation with the beds of limestone, and as this hill is of an eliptical form, the coals are found all around it. There are also two other hills, which lie with it in a direct line through the coal field — namely, Wrensnest hill, and Hurst hill. In the former, the same beds of lime* stone as those found in the Castle hill, have also been wrought to a great extent, by means of a canal cut through the hill, which gave Mr. Bald an opportu- nity of examining the internal form of the strata of the hOl, which are described by him as being com- pletely mantle-shaped. This hill is also of an ellip- tical form, and the beds of coal with their accom- panying strata, lie all around it, conforming with the beds of limestone, cropping towards the summit of the hill. From the truncated figure of the top of the hill, which is now arable land, it would appear, that at one time it had been much higher ; excepting these hills occur, inverting the ordinary figure of stratification, the great Staffordshire coal field is of the true basin shape.

Besides those extensive accumulations of carboni-

Memoirs of Wemerian Society, iii. 148.

128 The Coal Formation.

ferous strata, there are sometimes found outliers obscurely attached to the main formation, or detached portions forming small basins, not more than a mile in diameter, and called in the West Riding of York- shire, SwiUeys. Seams of coal, inferior in thickness to those belonging to the Newcastle coal formation, and interstratified with the encrinital limestone, as well as with sandstone and shale, are spread over most parts of Northumberleaid ; but owing to these landsale collieries" being generally inconsiderable in point of depth and extent of workings, the con- tinuity of the beds of coal never been accurately ascertained. Sections of coal mines in this formation are to be found iu the fourth volume of the Geological Transactions, where an account of Shilbotde collieiy, which supplies Alnwick with fuel, is given : and in the Transactions of the Natural History Society of Newcasflc, sections of the more important mines in the vicinity of Berwick-upon-Tweed are inserted. Mr. Wynch, from whose interesting papers these particulars are derived, gives a section of the colliery close to the old castle of Blenkinsop, 33 miles west of Newcastle. The deep pit at this place was 56 fathoms, and the viewer considered the position of the coal to be below the four fathom limestone, and above the great limestone of the Alston Moor mining field, and that the bed of coal was the same as that worked in the more extensive mines on Tynedale Fell. From these collieries Carlisle derives its coal.

The unexplored coal beds enveloped in the lime- stone, become important in considering the unre- solved problem of the extent and consequent duration of the northern mines.

Loud, and Edin, FhiU Mag. and Journal, Oct 1833; p !4.

Chapter Vii.

Coal Measures.

Meaning cf the terms " Cod Measures'' — Airange- ment, contortions, and dislocations of strata — Verti-- cal section of a deep pit near Newcastle — Tabular view of substances passed through — Gosforth colliery Depth of the High Main Seam at Jarrow — Sections of Mines at Dudley and Bilston — Inequality in the thickness of matter occurring between certain Coal seams — Tahular view of strata at Whitehaven — Synopsis of Coal measures at Ashby-de'la-Zonch — Staffordshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire, and York shire coal fields — Sheffield — Section at Halifax — Notices of the coal strata in South Wales, Scotland and Ireland — Occurrence of iron ores in the coal formation.

13 Y the term measures/' it is merely intended to designate the stratification of any particular coal dis-* trict, comprising what belongs to the dip, thickness, and depth, and composition of the several solid matters exposed and raised in the progress of mining. It wiU be obvious that, on sinking a pit in any coal-field, consisting of cavities bounded in the manner described in the preceding chapter, the concentric beds, of

130 Coal Measures.

whatever composition, might be expected to be met with more highly inclined, as the working takes place further from the centre of the mineral basin, suppos- ing its form to be tolerably complete. The realiza tion of this probability, however, will always depend very much upon the precise character of the local formation ; for, as the strata by upheaving or disloca- tion, may be thrown into a variety of positions, from the horizontal to the vertical, so the difficulty of judging from any data short of actual inspection, is proportionately enhanced.

Mr. Conybeare, in speaking of the coal measures says, the strata are generally inclined, and fre- quently at a very high angle, being entirely uncon- formable to those more horizontal beds which overlie them; they frequently also exhibit contortions as rapid and singular as those which occur in the tran- sition slate rocks below : appearances of this kind are displayed in a maimer peculiarly Hiking on the coasts of BrideVbay, Pembrokeshire, near Little- haven. It may be observed, that where the associated solid masses of limestone and sandstone are elevated in high angles, but still disposed in nearly regdar planes, the more tender argillaceous beds are gene-* rally twisted, and as it were crumpled together. The Mendip Hills and adjacent collieries in Somersetshire, afford an excellent illustration of this fact, which strongly suggests the idea of a mechanical force which has elevated the more solid rocks en masse ; while

It U Texy nncommon to find the CArboniferoiui strata thus higfaly in- clined ; yet at a place called the Bank, betwixt Edmonetone and Niddiy, not ▼ery far from £dinbui|$h} about two miles soath west from the sea, the strata are said to be in a perfectly vertical position ; pits of a ooniddeiable depth having some years ago, been sonic in a seam ot coal from top to bottom, with* outgoing into the stone on either side, which, had the working been horixontal or nearly so, would have been the roof and the floor of the coal.

DISLOCATIONS OF STRATA. 13t

the more yielding materials, giving v&y to its lateral pressure, have become irregarly contorted. These phenomena cannot be attributed to any internal power like crystallization ; for they appear to be common to all rocks, even those most decidedly mechanical in their structure. The faultSy or as they may be most appropriately termed, dislocations of the coal fieldi and of which we shall treat in the next chapt- still more irresistible evidences of their having been affected by violent mechanical convulsions subse- quently to their original formation. These faults consist of fissures traversing the strata, extending often for several miles, and penetrating to a depth in very few instances ascertained ; they are accompanied by a subsidence of the strata on one side of their Une, or (which amounts to the same thing) an elevation of them on the other ; so that it appears that the same force which has rent the rocks thus asunder, has caused one side of the fractured mass to rise, or the other to sink ; it being difficult, if not impossible to say (since in either case the disjointed masses would be the same) in which direction the absolute motion has taken place. Thus the same strata are found at different levels, on opposite sides of these faults, which appear to derive their name from their baffling for a time the pursuits of the miner ; they are also called trapsy probably from a northern word signifying a step, and the elevation or subsidence of the strata is described as their trap up or down. The change of level occasioned by these dislocations sometimes ex- ceeds 500 feet ; whence we may infer the immense violence of the convulsion, which had power to pro- duce motions of such vast masses to such an extent. The fissures are usually filled by clay, wliich has snb-

K 2

133 Coal Measures.

aequently filtered in, and often includes fragments disrupted from tbe contiguous strata ; their direction usually approaches to vertical/'

It will be at once apparent, from the preceding remarks, that the same beds of coal in sections of the same basin may be found at very different depths indeed, should the field in which they occur, besides possessing great sphericity of internal structure happen to be intersected by faults or fissures ; and, on the same account, it will be clear, that tbe details of one pit can rarely be taken as indicative of the depth to which it may be necessary to sink for coal in any particular district. It may indeed, exhibit generally the nature of the measures in any proximate portion of the same field ; and also, if the dip of the strata has been ascertained, it may afford in connexion with other circumstances, good criteria for determining the probable success of an adjacent shaft. To shew the various sorts of substances through which the northern miner has to pass before he comes at the object of his efforts, the following section of the strata, south of the main dike in Montagu Main col- lieiy, 3k miles above Newcastle, is taken fit)m a well written article on the subject.t The numbers in the first column on the left hand form an index, from which it will be immediately perceived, where the same strata occur ; the second column contains the number of the strata ; the third the names of each; and the fourth or numeral columns, express the thickness of each stratum in fathoms, yards, feet, and inches. It may also be premised concerning the five or six different classes of substances named, (hat whinstone is the hardest — so hard indeed, that

Introd. Geol. Fart I. p. 348. f Rees's Cydopndia, art. Coal.

Section At Newcastle. 138

angular fragments of it will cut glass, and affording on excellent material fw roads : post-stone is a veiy bard kind of freestone, of a fine, homogenous tex- tore; it is this stone which has heen woiked for centuries for grindstones, in various situations about Newcastle especially on Gateshead Fells, where it crops out : and also at Heworth shore, on the Dur- ham side of the Tyne, whre the most valuable quarries are situate. Sandstone is a freestone of a coarser grain than the last, and pervious to water ; it does not occur in the locality of the following section, but is found under the Iknestone, sometimes of considerable thickness — twenty fathoms or more ; metal stone is a hard argillaceous stratum, solid, compact, and interspersed with nodules of iron ore, and pyrites ; shiver bleas, or bladt metal, as the pit- men call it, is a sort of tough shale, often interlaid with lamina of spar coal, or other matters.

Purticnlan of the Stfsta. ThiokiiMs of aaeh StntuoL

Fa. Yds. Ft In.

0 1 SoU 0 0 10

0 2 Clay.. 2 0 2 0

1 3 White post 0 0 2 6

0 4 Coal 0 0 0 4

2 5 Blak metal stone 0 10 2

3 6 Grey post 1 12 0

4 7 Blae metal stone 2 110

3 8 Grey post 2 0 0 0

1 9 Strong white post 2 10 0

3 10 Grey post 0 110

5 11 White post, with black metal part-

ings 5 0 0 0

3 12 Grey post 0 0 1 4

6 13 Brown post, with coal pipes 0 118

114 White post 2 1 0 0

7 15 Ditto, mixed with whin 0 1 0 0

Carried over 22 0 1 0

134 Coal Measures.

PtrticvUiB of the Strata. Thicknen of each Stntimi

Fa. Yds. Ft In.

Bnmght forward...22 0 10

0 16 Coal 0 0 0 6

2 17 Black metal stone 4 10 0

8 18 Grey metal stone 4 2 0 0

9 19 Brownpostywithskanny partings... 0 110

0 20 Coal 0 0 0 9

8 21 Grey metal stone 1 1 2 10

10 22 Coan 0 0 1 9

11 23 Band> Bbnvell Main 0 0 0 6

10 24 CoaO 0 1 0 0

8 25 Grey metal stone 0 110

1 26 Strong white post 2 110

12 27 Whin 0 0 2 0

1 28AVhitepost 10 2 0

0 29 Coal 0 0 18

2 30 Black metal stone 1 10 0

1 31 White post 3 0 0 0

2 32 Black metal stone 4 10 0

8 33 Grey ditto 5 0 2 4

13 34 Ditto post, with whin girdles 2 10 0

1 35 Strong white post 6 0 2 0

8 36 Grey metal stone.. 3 0 2 0

0 37 Coal 0 0 0 8

14 38 Post girdles 0 0 2 0

8 39 Grey metal stone 10 10

15 40 Coal, Beaumont SsAM 0 10 4

16 41 Strong white thill 0 10 7

1 42 Ditto, ditto, post 2 0 0 4

0 43 Coal 0 0 16

17 44 Black thill 0 0 2 4

8 45 Grey metal stone 0 0 12

3 46 Ditto post 0 0 2 0

8 47 Ditto metal stone 0 0 2 10

1 48 Strong white post 0 10 4

0 49 Coal 0 0 13

2 50 Black metal stone 1 0 2 4

1 61 White post 0 0 18

18 52 Blue metal stone, with post girdles 10 0 0

Carried over 76 0 0 8

SECTION AT NEWCASTLE. l35

Fntiealaii of Um Strata. TliiokMMorMch Stntum.

Fa. Tdfc Ft la.

Brought forward. ..76 0 0 8

19 53 White post, with whin ginlles S 0 1 9

3 56 Gieypoat 0 0 12

4 56 Blue metal stone 0 10 0

1 57 Strong white poet 0 0 13

4 58 Blue metal stone I 0 2 1

0 50 Coo/ 0 0 0 8

17 60 Black thill 0 10 4

18 51 Blue metal stone, with post girdles 10 10 3 62 Grey post 0 10 0

1 63 Strong white posL 3 1 2

20 66 Coal, Low Main 0 0 2 11

8 66 Grey metal stone 4 10 0

167 White post 2 10 0

21 68 Grey metal stone, with post girdles 10 0 0

19 69 While post, with whin girdles 3 0 16

21 70 Grey metal stone, with post ditto... 0 110

22 71 Coal, Low Low Maih 0 0 2 10

8 72 Grey metal stone 0 I 2 0

1 73 White post 0 0 2 0

8 74 Gray metal stone r. 0 0 16

2 75 Black metal ditto 0 0 0 10

8 76 Grey ditto ditto 10 2 6

3 77 Ditto post 1 0 0 6

19 78 Strong white post, with whin girdles 3 118

8 79 Grey metal stone 3 0 2 6

3 80 Post ditto 0 0 2 0

1 81 White post 0 12 0

8 82 Grey metal stone 0 0 10

0 83 Coai 0 0 0 6

8 84 Grey metal stone 0 0 10

21 85 Ditto, with post girdles 3 0 2 2

0 86 Coal 0 0 0 5

Carried over 116 12 3

ThU Is what is called, in the Hetton Colliery, the Hutfeon Seam,** from the name of the indiyidoal who first attempted to win the excellent coal of which it here consists, and which lies at the great depth of 147 fathoms.

136 Coal Measures.

PaiticvUn of tka SUaU. Thickness of each Stntiim.

Fa. Yds. Ft. In.

Brought forward... 116 1 2 3

8 87 Grey OQQtal stone 0 0 0 4

3 88 Ditto post 10 16

7 89 White ditto, mixed with whin 2 10 4

8 00 Grey metal stone 0 0 10

0 91 Coal 0 0 0 3

2 92 Grej metiilstone, with post girdles 10 0 6

19 93 Stjcong white postwith whin ditto... 0 12 6

122 1 2 3

In looking over the foregoing details it is impos- sible not to be struck, first, with the great number of beds of various matters interstratified with the coal, amounting to nearly one hundred successive sedi- mentarj depositions of different matters, and exhi- biting various degrees of induration ; second, with the thinness of the layers of coal, at the point of intersection — the Beaumont seam alone reaching a yard in thickness ; while the stratum of the Low Main is under two feet, and that of Benwell Main only six inches: and, third, the depth of the section itself is remarkable, being upwards of one hundred and twenty-two fathoms, or two hundred and forty-five yards.

The above section of strata, however, is inferior in every respect to the detaJs obtained in the sinking of a shaft at Gosforth colliery, about two miles north of Newcastle, which was finished in October, 1827. In fliis work, the number of strata sunk through reached one hundred and forty-one, the total depth being upwards of one hundred and eighty-eight fathoms. Forty-three seams of coal were pierced, many of them, as in the section above, very tliin.

Depth Of High Main Coal. 137

Mr. Wynch, from whose interesting paper these particulars are derived, remarks that " the section of this mine is peculiarlj interesting in a geological point of view ; not only from the great number of strata passed through, but owing to the shafts by which the coal was won being sunk on the south side of the main dyke, and the coal obtained hj a drift driven due north through it/' This mode of coming at the coal is understood to have been adopted for the purpose of avoiding th water supposed to be accu- mulated in the rents and fissures of the strata towards the north, while the coal-field on the south side of the djke, was known to have been drained by the Heaton and other engines, to the dip of the Gosforth mine.

At St. Anthonys colliery, about three miles below Newcastie, they find the High Main coal, (not dis- tinguished in the preceding section,) at the depth of seventy-sLX fathoms, and measuring exactly one fathom in thickness f : at one hundred and thirty-five

CoBtrilmtiofM lo tbe Geology oi NorthamberUuid and Thahasm, Loud, and JSdln. PhiL Mag. Jvly, 1833, p. Sa

f The High Main coal occura in the Manor Wallaend colliery, near Soath SUdds, at the depth of 136 fathoma : it there oonaiats of fire layers — the second and Ibortfa eooaiatlng of baada of coal of an inferior quality, making together 1 fath. 0 feet, 5 inches. This deterioration of the atratam ia called the Heworth band, aa it commences in tbe workinga of the colliery of that name. Mr. Wynch remarks that, vieirera or profearional men have lon been aware, thai from the neighbourhood of Heworth, the High Main coal, the veiy beat aeam on the Tyne, or eren in the north of England, became iignred aa it proceeded in a aonth eaateriy direction, by being inter- mixed by a band of coal of inferior quality with an admixtnre of strong matter and iron pyrifeea." Owing to the intervention of the band above named, an opinion was long prevalent that no mine could be worked with profit near or under the magnesian limeatone formation. I am not aware,'* adds Mr. Wynch, that the limeatone was ever thought Co be the direct eauae of rendering the coal of inferior quality : but one thing was certain, that whenever the collieriea on the aouth side of the Tyne extended their workings in the direction of the limestone hills, the Heworth band was sure to injure the coal.'*

138 Coal Measures.

ftkthoms the Low Main coal is found upwards of a fiUhom thick. Janrow about five miles from the mouth of the Tjme, and on its southern side, is the spot beneath which the bituminous beds in the coal- measures in this neighbourhood are found at their greatest depth ; the High Main stratum is 060 feet below the grass at Jarrow and rises on all sides ; but as the dip of the strata (which averages one inch in twenty) is notunifonn in every part of the uironnd- ing district that bed does not rise to the sur&ce at equal distances around that place. Mr. Conybeare, from whose statement these particulars are derived goes on to remark that as the High Main coal rises to the surface of the alluvial soil, around Jarrow, we may conclude that the beds of it above and below the High Main arise also at a distance from it, propor- tionate to their depth beneath it These beds, and the other strata composing the coal measures, are not every where of uniform thickness, but occasionally enlarge or contract so greatly, that it is only by an extensive comparison of the whole series, that any certainty is arrived at concerning that general uni- formity of stratification which is known to exist*

Mr. Bald has given in the Memoirs of the Wer- nerian Society, a section, and Messrs. Conybeare and Phillips, in their Introduction to Geology, a table of the coal and associated beds, as occurring at Dudley, in Staffordshire. From this table we see that the beds distinguished by different names in this coal

The difficulty of identifying the yaiious coal seams north and south of the great dyke or dislooation of the northern field) is admitted by all writers on the sulgect: indeed, such identity as regards the minor sevns espedally, is still a problem unresolved." An interesting Synopsis of the principal Coal Seams on the Tyne and Wear (18 in number) is given by Mr. Buddie, in Trans. Nat Hist. Soc. Northum. i. 219.

Section At Dudley. 139

formatiou, but consisting most of sandstone, and a sort of clay shale, provincially called cbmch, amount to wMy-five, and that its whole thickness is 313 yards, 1 foot, and 3 inches, or about 156 fathoms, somewhat more than the depth of the High Main coal at Jatrow. There is another particular, how- ever, in which the South Staffordshire collieries differ most strikingly from those on the Tyne : the main coal, which is the great object of the colliers in the former country, is about fathoms below the sur- face in the neighbourhood of Dudley, ten yards in thickness: about thirty yards below it, lies another hedjive yards thick. The beds of coal are eleven in number — &ve above, and five below the main coal ; none of the former are considered worth working. The ten*yard, or main coal, which is of a slaty tex- ture, consists, in fact, of thirteen different laminae, which were thus distinguished in Dr. Plott's some of the terms being still in use about Dudley :-

Ft In.

1 Roof floor, or top floor 4 0

2 After a parting of four inches of soft, dark

earth — top slipper, or over slipper 2 2

3 Jays 2 0

White stone (PaUhel) 0 1

4 Lambs 1 0

5 Tough Kitts, or heath 1 6

6 Benches 1 6

7 Brassils, or corns 1 6

Fool coal parting (wnutmss only,)

TMcknen 13 9

8 Foot coal, or bottom slipper 1 8

John coal parting. . 1 inch.

9 John coal, or slips, or veins*. 3 0

Hard $tone, 10 inchct or k$i.

10 Stone coal, or long coal 4 0

Carried over 8 8

140 Coal Measures.

Ft In.

Brought forward... 8 8

11 Sawyer, or springs 1 6

12 Slipper 2 6

Humphrey parting.

13 Humphreys, or bottom bench— or Omfray

floor 2 3

Total Main Coal 28 8

Of these different beds, the upper one, or roof floor, is generally left to support the earth and chinch above it ; the second, third, and fourth beds, which together are called the white coal, are reckoned the best for chamber fires. Next to them in goodness are reckoned the eleventh and twelfth beds; after them, some the eighth, ninth, and tenth. The toughs and benches are preferred for making cokes ; and are generallj reserved for the furnaces : they do not kindle and flame so vividly as the foregoing, but they give a more durable and stronger heat. The part of the brassil measure which contains pyrites, is generally laid .aside, or used for burning bricks or lime : the humphrey being the lowest portion, is cut away to let those above fall down, and, therefore, most of it is reduced to small coal or slack.

The beds dip towards the south, and rise towards the north ; so that at Bilston the main coal crops out and disappears altogether.

The strata m the mines at Bradley, near Bilston, are noted by Pitt as follows : —

No. Stnta. Depth.

Ft In.

1 Surfacesoil 1 6

2 Clay and ratch 9 0

Carried over 10 6

Section Near Bilston. 141

Now Strata. Deplh.

Ft. In.

Brooght forward... 10 6

3 Climch 2 6

4 Ironstone 0 2k

5 Clanch 3 0

6 Ironstone 0 2

7 Soft clay 0 2

8 Dark batty dunch 3 0

9 Gray jointy rock 4 0

10 Ironstone 0 li

1 1 Rock-binds with ironstone 4 0

12 Soft parting 0 1

13 Strong black rock 4 0

UDarkclonch 7 0

15 Ironstone 0 5

16 Dark clunch, with ironstone 5 0

17 Ditto, faller of ironstone 0 10

18 Soft clay 1 8

19 Batt 2 3

20 Bn)och coal 3 6

21 Fireclay 0 4

22 Black ironstone 0 1

23 Black earth 1 6

24 Ironstone 0 2

25 Black earth and ironstone 1 6

26 Ironstone 1 6

27 Rock-binds, with ironstone 10 0

28 Dark earth, with ironstone 6 0

29 Rock-binds, with ironstone 9 0

30 Peldon 4 0

31 Grey rock 23 0

32Darkclunch 2 0

To the Main Coal HO 6

33 White coal 3 0

34 Tow (or tough) coal 2 3

35 Benches and brassfls 4 6

36 Foot coal 2 3

37 Slip batt 2 3

Carried oyer 14 3

142 Coal Measures.

Na Strata. Z>epeli.

PL In.

Brought forward... 14 3

38 Slips ; 2 3

39 Stone coal parting 0 4

40 Stone coal and patchells , 4 6

41 Penny coal 0 6

42 Springs and slippers 4 6

43 Hamfry batt 0 4

44 Humfries 2 3

Mam Coal Stratum 28 11

Upper Stratum 110 5

WhoU Depth 139 4

Of the above named strata, the surface soil is a gravelly loam : No. 2, is generally rubbish, but m some places the clay will make brick ; No. 3, clunchi a mouldering argillaceous schistus, of no value, which falls into a dark coloured powder ; No. 4, and some other layers of ironstone, as may easily be con- ceived, will not pay for getting, unless incumbent or appendant to some other useful strata which are got for use ; the rocks. No. 9 and 31, are of no particular value, except to mend roads and for burr walls ; No. 20, brooch coal, is useful, and sometimes got ; the thicker strata, Nos. 16, 16, 17, 24, 26, 26, 27, 28,

29, are got as far as they will pay for getting ; No.

30, Peldon, contains nodules of hard, basaltic, durable stone, too hard to cut, and of no use except for rough walls, or to mend roads, or for pavements. Of the strata 33 to 34, the white coal is very good for general use ; the tow coals and brassils are esteemed for furnaces ; the others are of various value.

At Catchems' Comer, near Bilston, a pit has been sunk, to the depth of 366 feet 8 inches, and piercing

Intervening Deposits. 143

sixty-three strata; nine of these being useful coal lying below the main seam, and forming collectively a thickness of 28 feet 1 inch. Besides which there are seven strata of good ironstone.

Mr. Conybeare mentions a very curious phenomenon as occurring at Bloomfield colUery, south of Bilston : the two upper beds of main coal, called the roof floor and top slipper, separate from the rest, and are dis- tinguished by the name of the flying reed: this separation at Bradley colliery amounts to twelve feet, four beds of shale, slate clay, and ironstone being interposed. This curious intervention seems to indicate that the different beds of which the main coal consbts, were deposited at different times. A similar deviation from uniformity in the thickness of an intervening layer occurs in the Yorkshire coal field: at Sheffield, one of the beds wliich is about seven feet in thickness, includes a parting called the clod, which is six inches thick, and requires to be thrown out on getting the coal ; passing, however, in a zig- zag line northward, this band of dirt enlarges — aris- ing above the base like a hill — until at Chapeltown, five miles off*, it has become 20 yards thick, the divided stratum, being here, of course, worked and designated as two beds. At Silkstone, near Bams- ley, this striking accumulation of non-inflammable Jtter, has 8hn4 to its first mentioned dimensions as a mere dirt band in the workable seam of the Sheffield coal.

According to a statement in Townshend's 'Vindi- ciae Moses,'' the Cumbrian coal fields have been but partially explored : at Howgill, west of Whitehaven, seven beds have been wrought, and the workings

Introd. Geol. part i. p. 412.

Coal Measures.

carried more tlmn oue thousand yards under the sea, and about six hundred feet below its bottom, the strata still dipping westward, at a considerable angle.

The following is an exact account of the different beds of coal, their depth below the surface, dis- tance between each other, and thickness of each bed, in the old King pit, situated about 700 yards to the west of Whitehaven, near the sea shore. The top of this pit is elevated twenty-seven fathoms, one yard, and seven inches, above the level of the sea: —

1st bed... 2Dd bed . .

Depth

below the

surface.

Distance between the beds.

Thickness

of each bed.

]5

Vdi.

Path.

Ydi.

Ft

In.

Reinarits.

An inferior kind of coal. Ditto, yet saleable.

Between the second and third beds are seven thin seams of coal.

3rd bed..

Mixed withseveFBl impu- rities.

Then follow three thin seams.

4th bed.. 101

Some layers are very pure, others much mixed with ferruginous and other earths.

A thin bed of coal, after which

Then follow four thin seams.

After three thin seams, occurs the

7th bed..

A little inferior in quality, but yet very inflamma- ble.f

Thwaite Pit, in the Howgill colliery, which was sank 149 fathoms to the sixth hed of coal, was formerly supposed to be the deepest pit in England.

t Brownrigg*8 Literary Life, p. 125.

Sections Of Strata. 146

At Wliiiigill, north-east of Whitehaven the beds are from four to ten feet in thickness, and dip one yard in ten : in the depth of 165 fathoms they work seven large beds, and have noticed eighteen thin ones. At Preston How, they cut fourteen beds of coal before they met with one at all considerable, but the fifteenth bed proved more than five feet in thick- ness ; and the seventeenth, separated firom the former by twenty-four beds of slate, ironstone, sandstone, and one thin seam of coal was nearly eight feet in thickness.

There are some considerable mines in Warwickshire, at Griflf and Bedworth ; at the former place, four beds of coal are worked, the depth of the first being 117 yards, and the principal seam nine feet in thickness ; the works of the latter place are on the same bed, but here the first and second coal seams of Grifirun together, and constitute one five-yard seam.

A section of the Ashby coal-field, at the village of Donisthorpe, as given by Mr. Mammett, presents us with ninety-three alternations of strata included in a depth of 475 feet, or nearly 79 fathoms. There are five beds of coal of different qualities, and averag- ing about three feet in thickness, occurring at inter- vals above the main" and '' nether" coals, which are in contact, and together fourteen feet in thick- ness. At Moira colliery on Ashby Wolds, the floor of the main coal lies at the depth of 744 feet ; and in the Hastings' pit, more towards the middle of the basin, the main seam, of which the upper half alone is at present wrought, reposes on a stratum of fire clay about 1000 feet below the surface. The beds alternating with the coal, are mostly in different sandstones, ironstone, bind in different stages of in-

h

140 Coal Measures.

duration, and a valuable fire clay. About Biurslem, in the north of StafTordshire, where several pits are wrought in what is sometimes called the Pottery coal field— thirty-beds of coal have been noticed ; they are, in general, from about three to ten feet in Sick- ness. One of the beds, forming part of the South Lancashire field, and worked near Manchester, is a

four feet coal.

It would be improper to pass over without more particular notice, the measures of the great York- shire and Derbyshire coal field, wliich, in the opinion of Mr. Conybeare, rivals or even surpasses m im- portance that of Northumberland, with which it so closely agrees m the diiection, inclination, and chaiucter of its strata, that it has been considered a re-emergence of the same beds from beneath the covering of magnesian limestone, which conceals them through so long an interval.*

According to Mr. Farey,t the carboniferous group of this extensive and important distiict, consists of about twenty gritstone rocks of different kmds, in- cluding within their planes of parallelism, at fewest twelve seams of workable coal, but probably more, with their accompanying shales and beds of nodular or other ironstone. The same author has given a list of about 500 collieries in work upon these seams in 1811, or that had been worked there in former years. Those pits particularised were, for the most part, situated in Derbyshire or Yorkshire j many of them had been carried on for a long period antecedent to the above date, and several are not yet abandoned: of course, a considerable number of new works have

InUrod. Geol., p. 378.

+ Agricultural Survey of Derbyshire, vol. i. 181.

Derbyshire And Yorkshire. 147

been established in this vast field, during the inter- vening twenty years. Of the pits in the list adverted to, of which the seams into which they were sunk are distinghed, the first seam contained 59 pits ; the second, 77 : the third, 25 ; the fourth, 5 ; the fifth, 3 ; the sixth, 1 ; the seventh, 6 ; the eighth, 28 ; the ninth, 23 ; the tenth, 20 ; the eleventh, 8 ; and the twelfth, 24 pits. As the measures dip mostly from west to east, and as the foregoing num- bers, indicative of succession of strata, are reckoned firom the lowest to those above, the former, or lowest members alternate with the millstone grit forming the bold mountain scenery west of Sheffield, while the latter pass beneath the magnesian limestone which extends in a lofty ridge to the east of that town.

The vicinity of Rotherham is distinguished by a remarkable and thick soft salmon-coloured grit stone, conspicuously reddening the arable soil, and which Mr. Farey supposed to be identical with number six- teen of his series. The principal vicinal seams of coal, at present worked for the supply of the impor- tant manufacturing town of Sheffield, in addition to pits at Birley Moor, in the tenth seam above indicated, are five in number, lying between the before men- tioned salmon-coloured grit, or as it is locally termed Rotherham red rock," and the Wortley sandstone : the latt, overlying another series of beds associated with the millstone grit above mentioned. Taking the strata in the descending order, the first to be mentioned is the Tinsley Park coal, which consists of an upper seam four feet in thickness ; and at a depth of 13 fathoms lower down, occurs another seam 27 inches thick, of dull stony aspect, very hard, and called from the use to which it is largely applied,

148 Coal Measures.

Furnace coal. About 20 fathoms still lower we come to what is locally termed the High Hazles seam, consisting of seven layers of different appear- ance and qualities, and making together a thickness of about a yard and a quarter. Fifty fathoms below the bott(n of the last mentioned, lies the Handsworth seam, four feet six inches in thickness, and exhibiting eight distinct laminae, technically known as tops, bright, best bright, top hards, dead bed, black hards, spire hards, and pricking coal : the four varieties preceding the last named, are largely in demand by the furnace men employed in converting steel. The lowest portion of this seam, where wrought at Atter- cliffe, yields a vast quantity of the variety called cannel coal, being of a fine homogeneous texture, excellently adapted to the purposes of the turner, for which it has been fetched to Birmingham ; and also affording on distillation abundance of gas, — ShefKeld having at one time been exclusively illuminated by the gas evolved from it. One hundred fathoms below Handsworth bed, we come to the Manor seam, five feet in thickness, and divided into fifteen distinct layers, including two of soil. Under this, after a barren interval of fifty-five fathoms, comes what is called the Sheffield bed, six feet in thickness, and presenting six or eight varieties of coal, some of them abounding with pyrites, and occasionally pro- ducing near the top a beautiful and compact kind of cannel, or as it is called in Yorkshire, branch coal. The measures dip rapidly towards the east, the basset or outcrop of most of the seams being traceable in the vicinity of the town ; two or three acres of the last mentioned coal being, as elsewhere noticed, denuded in one part by the formation of new streets.

Ganister Coal Seaies. 149

In 1832, Mr. Pliills, one of the Secretaries of the British Association, conununicated to the York- shire Philosophical Society, a paper on the lower, or ganister coal series of Yorkshire*, containing some remarks on the fossil productions of the strata, and which have been noticed in a previous chapter. The writer defines this series by saying that it is included between the millstone grit of Bramley beneath, and the flagstone of Elland above, having a thickness of about 120 or 150 yards, and inclosing, near the bottom two thin seams of coal, one or both of them workable, and several other layers scattered through the mass, too thin to be worth working. The most regular and continuous beaiing of aU these coal seams, is stated to be, in a few places, of the thickness of 27 or 30 inches, but is generally only about 16 inches. The coal here alluded to is that occurring in the second and third of Farcy's seams indicated above : it is worked at several places near Leeds, Bradford, Halifax, and Sheffield. The following is a section of Swan Banks Colliery, near Halifax, as furnished to Mr, Phillips, by C. Rawson, Esq. of the latter place ; and is said to present a good idea of the general character of the whole of this lowest coal series.

Yds. Ft In.

Ragstone (the lower part of the Elland

flagstone) 27 0 0

BUck shale 40 0 0

Coal (80 yards hand coal) 0 0 6

Rag 4 0 0

Bkck shale .28 0 0

Coal (48 yards band coal) 0 0 11

Grey shale 0 2 0

Black shale 7 1 3

Dirt band (black tough clay) 0 0 3

150 Coal Measures.

Yd. Ft In.

Black shale 4 1 6

Coal (36 yards coal band) 0 0 7

Black shale ; 12 0 0

Rag and shale 13 0 0

Black shale 7 0 0

Shale and ironstone (called hard band), flat

baum pots 0 2 3

Grey shale (called White Earth), with small

round baum pots containing 10 0

Concretions (called baum Pots), with Am-

monites,&c 0 10

Black shale (called Moon Bassett), with

Pectens 0 10

Coal (the hard band coal) worked 0 2 3

Seatstone 0 10

Seat earth (white clay), with vegetable fossils 2 0 0

Grey shale 5 0 0

Black shale 4 16

Coal (middle band ooal) 0 0 10

Middle band stone -. 110

Black shale ; 8 0 0

Layer of fresh water shells ( Unto) 0 1 0

Black shale 3 10

Ironstone , 0 0 3

Black shale 0 0 8

Coal (the soft bed coal) workable 0 15

Upper millstone grit, on which Halifax stands.

In the above, and another section through similar substances, adduced by Mr. Phillips, " we observe," says this intelligent geologist, " besides the very re- markable layers of marine shells*, several occur-

The nndoabted occurrence of marine shells has been complacentlj ap- pealed to by those who incline to the notion of a diluvial ratherlhan a lacustrine origin of our coal deposits. So far, howerer, as the presence of ctiawtenstic testacea goes, the evidence, if not equaJ, is not in farour of shells desciibed a heterogenous assemblage of planto and strata'of Coalh t salt-water species, as occurring in the carboniferous has found at VntJ''' authority, that Mr.Mnrchisson

nterhurg and elsewhere on the opposite side of the Severn,

Strata In South Wales. 151

Fences of a peculiar liard siliceous sandstone, called Galliard, Ganister or Seatstone (according to local custom or slight differences), which in fact is the same thing as the 'crowstone' of the mountain lime- stone district in the north-west of Yorkshire, and like that contains in abundance the remains of plants, particularly of the genus Stifffnaria, Brong. By the extreme abundance of plants of this kind, indeed, the galliard beds may almost always be recognised throughQut their range in Yorkshire. This stone, in some cases, forms the floor or sill of the coal seams, — circumstance never observed in the upper coal strata, amongst which, indeed, galliard never occurs in its true character. Hence this whole group of strata may be appropriately called the Galliard or Ganister coal series.'*

The coal measures of the great South Welsh basin are on a magnificent scale, both as to extent and thickness : the depth at which the miner reaches the different strata varies greatly, depending upon the situation of the pit. The principal part of the coal lies under Glamorganshire, and here the strata are found from 6 fathoms to 6 or 700 fathoms deep j though in 1806, Mr. Martin states, it had not been found necessary to pursue these strata deeper than about 80 fathoms. There are 12 distinct seams of coal in this immense mineral depository, from 3 feet to 9 feet thick each ; which together make 70i feet :

a band of compact limestone between two beds of coal, resembling the lacustrine limestone central France, and containing fresh-water shells." Some anthore, in order to acooant for the mixture of these different shells, ha?e had recourse to the gratuitous notion of a series o( reciprocating inun- dations of salt and fresh water : ingenious experiments have likewise been instituted, to shew the possibility of habituating marine testacea to live in fresh water, and those of our lakes to exist in the sea. Phil. Mag. and Journ. of Science, Nov. 1832. p. 3J2.

152 Coal Measures.

and there are 1 1 more, from 18 inches to 3 feet, which make 24i feet ; besides a number of smaller seams from 12 to 18 inches, and from 6 to 12 inches in diickness, not calculated upon. The average length and breadth of the different strata of coal are computed at about 1000 square miles, containing 95 feet of coal in 23 distinct strata, which will produce, in the common way of working, 100,000 tons per acre, or 64,000,000 tons per square mile. The coal at the east end of the basin, from PontypocJ to Hir- wain Furnace, is of a coking quality ; from thence to Bride's Bay, at the opposite extremity, the strata yield stone-coal, or culm ; on the south side of the basin, the coals are principally of a bituminous, or binding quality.*

Some of the coal fields of Scotland contain seams of surprising tbickness : in Clackmannanshire, where exists the north-east boundary of the Scottish coal district, the beds alternate with a great variety of other strata. In the main coal field, the formation has been examined to the depth of 704 feet ; with some exceptions, the stratification exhibits great re* gularity, the layers being in many instances very thin. There are 142 alternations of strata, including 24 beds of coal ; these beds or seams are from two inches to five feet in thickness, six of them being three feet or upwards, amounting together to 59 feet 4 inches. The principal bed is at the depth of 120 yards; and the coal is of the cubical and slaty varieties; sometimes both sorts occurring together, but no blind or glance coal. It is all what is called open burning coal, having little or no tendency to cake. In the Johnstone coal field, near Paisley, the

Phil. Trani. vol. 96. p. 346.

Scotland And Ireland. 153

upper stratum of rock is compact greenstone, above 100 feet in thickness, not in conforming position with the coal strata, but overlying ; then a few fathoms of soft sandstone and slate-clay alternating and uncom- monly soft. Under this, in one place, there are no fewer than ten beds of coal lying one immediately over the other, with a few divisions of dark coloured indurated clay. These beds of coal are in thickness, no less than 100 feet: this, Mr. Bald remarks, is a mass of combustible matter in the form of coal, pro- bably unparalleled in the world. The largest seam of the Tranent collieries, near Haddingn, is said to be nine feet thick.

Of the coal strata, in Ireland, we have few parti- culars. Lord Greenock* has pointed out that the appearance of the carboniferous series in Arran, and at Cambelton, in Kintyre, as well as the indications of its existence at Ballycastle, and other places on the Irish coast, within prolongation of the lines above named, as indicating the Scottish lowland coal district, seems fully to establish the geological con- nection in this, as well as in most other respects, between the west of Scotland and the north-west of Ireland. In the Dromagh colliery, in the Munster district, as we learn from Mr. Griffith, all the beds hitherto discovered have been successively and suc- cessfully wrought : four of these beds incline on each other at no greater distance than 200 yards. The first is a three feet stone coal, and is the leading bed. All the faults, checks, and dislocations similar to those which are discoverable in this bed, are in general ,to be encountered in the other three ; the names of the four beds are, the coal bed ; this lies

Before the Royal Society of Edinburgh, December, 1834; Jameson's Jonmal, Aprils 1835, p. 384.

154 Coal Measures.

further to the north ; the rock coal, so called from its being comparatively of a harder quality than the other beds ; the bulk bed, so called from its contents being found in large masses or bulks ; and Bathes bed, so called from the name of a celebrated English miner, by whom it had been many years ago dis- covered and worked ; the coal bed consists of three- feet solid coal, and is not sulphureous ; the rock coal is nearly of the same thickness with the leading bed, but is very sulphureous, and having the soundest roof is the most easily wrought. The other beds are of the culm species, but of peculiar strength : each barrel of culm having been ascertained to bum from nine to ten barrels of the lime of the district. The bulk bed forms, as already stated, immense masses of culm, in which the miners have frequently been un- able to retain the ordinary direction of roof and seat. No work in this district has been carried deeper than eighty yards, as in the Dromagh colliery, where the coal is heavily watered, and the consequent expen- siveness of working is very considerable.

The occurrence of the argillaceous carbonate of Iron, either in the form of nodules or of continuous beds, in immediate connexion with the coal seams, is a circumstance of immense importance, as lying at the foundation of the manufacturing superiority of this country. In South Wales, Staifordshire, York- shire, and other parts of the United Kingdom, par- ticularly in Scotland, the proximate abundance of coal and ironstone has led to the establishment of those immense smelting works, upon the success or deterioration of which such such vast outlays of capital, and the industry and happiness of so many thousands of individuals depend.

It is not necessary in a work, the object of which

Ores Of Iron. 155

is not statistical, to particularise the succession and locality of the ironstone strata, as for the most part, they are found wherever the coal formation occurs. In some cases, the one is sparingly, in others most abundantly interspersed in the carbonaceous group. In the great South Welsh coal field, immediately upon the millstone grit, which overlies a mass of mountain limestone, 85 fathoms in aggregate thick- ness, reposes a thick series of shale beds, alternating with thin bands of hard sandstone. The first visible or lowest seam of coal, occurring in this shale is two inches thick : a few fathoms above this seam there occur fipom fourteen to sixteen beds of ironstone, nine of which are visible at the surface ; they are em- bedded in shale, and occupy a perpendicular depth of 13 to 14 fathoms, continuing their range to the eastward; these are the principal beds firom which the supply of ore for the Welsh iron works is pro- cured. According to Mr. Forster,* these ores yield about 26 per cent of iron; there are several other beds interstratified with the different seams of stone coal. The mines in the Forest of Dean furnish a curi- ous stalactite, rich in iron, and termed brush ore, from its being found hanging from the tops of caverns in stri resembling a brush. The Lanca- shire ore is very ponderous, of a lamellated texture, and of a dark shining purple or bluish colour. The rich Cumberland ore resembles in colour the last mentioned, while its polished surface seems to consist of congeries of various sized bubbles, as if the mass had once been in a state of ebullition.f Besides the

ObMrrations on South Welsh Coal Basin in Troiu. Nmt. HisL Soc, Newcastle, toI. i. p. 100, a highly intarosUng account

t Lardner's Cab. CyclopaBdia, Manufactures in Metal,** toI. i. p. 33. A very elaborate and interesting investigation of the composition of the

156 Coal Measures.

valuable deposits of argiUaceoas iron ore which, ex- isting in immediate contact with most excellent coal, have given to Wednesbuiy so distinguished a place among the iron manufactories of this kingdom, may be added the occurrence of a peculiar species of the ore called Blond metal, and which after being smelted, is used for the making of a variety of tools. The coal in this neighbourhood, is reckoned the best in the kingdom for the smith's forge : it is found in beds of from three to fourteen feet in thickness. Wolverhampton, another extensive manufacturing town in this county, owes its celebrity to the favour- able position in which it is placed with reference to subterranean riches, and inland navigation. Situated nearly in the centre of the kingdom, in the midst of the most productive coal and iron mines, and having a free and easy access to the great rivers Thames, Severn, Trent, and Mersey, by means of the dif- ferent danals which surround it, eveiy opportunity is afforded of conveying and receiving materials and merchandise.

argillaceous carbonates of iron, from which by far the greatest pioportioii of our British iron is smelted, is printed in Brewster's Edinburgh Joomal for .1837 — 8, from the pen of Dr. Coluhonn.

Pitt's Staffordshire, p. 171.

Chapter Viii.

Dislocations Of Strata.

Cammcn occurrence of fissured strata — Longmires theory of veinSy dykes, rents, sUps, ifc. — How cha racterised — Upthrow and downthrow dykes — Sec- tion of fractured coal measures at Jarrom — Enor- mous disturbances produced by faults — Great trap dyke of Yorkshire and Durham — 7%e ninetyfathom dyke of Northumberland — The seventy-yards Whin dyke — The great Derbyshire denudation* of Fa- rcy— Nonconformity of overlying and subjacent masses — Supposed igneous origin of trap or basaltic dykes — Advantages of those dislocations misnamed fauUs " — Professor Buckland*s observations.

Although several allusions have already been made to the subject of this Chapter, it is of too inte- resting a nature, in every point of view, to be merged in merely incidental notices. From what has been said already, it will have appeared, that besides the divisions of strata into different substances, often re- peated after certain intervals, and generally extend- ing in parallel series, variously inclined through the coal measures, there are certain fissures or fractures often nearly vertical, stretching through the whole

158 Dislocations Of Strata.

mass in a very singular manner, and betokening a \iolent upheaving or subsidence, and consequent separation of formerly continuous or adjacent portions. These fentSy which every one must have remarked on a small scale, in almost every stone qnarry, and which traverse the coal formation in every Strict, are not only striking objects of inquiry to die geolo- gist, but of vast importance in mining operations ; and although generally termed faults, they are in reality of immense benefit in our colliery operations. In the " Annals of Philosophy" for the year 1815, there is an elaborate essay on the shapes, dimensions, and positions of the spaces in the earth which are called Rents, and the arrangement of the matter in them, by Mr. J. B. Longmire, of Kendal. The ob- ject of the writer is to prove that metallic veias, dykes, slips, and other rents, in the internal part of the earth, were formed when it was passing from a fluid to a solid state, and are owing to an unequal contraction of its matter ; and that the phenomena of stratification and formations, in some points of view, as well as the features of the earth at its surface, are effects of the same cause. Most of these fissures particularly those supposed to have been the earliest formed, appear to have been filled by some of the matter at their sides being forced into them while yet in a fluid state, by the pressure of the superin- cumbent mass: others appear to have been filled with matter that, at a later period, entered them either in a fluid state, as greenstone, basalt, &c., or in a solid state, as gravel, sand, and clay, generally mingled with firagments of the adjoining strata. The mineralogical compounds of the first class, varying in character from distinct granitoidal crystalliza

MR. lonomire's theory. 159

lion of their original base, to the compact basalt, ex- hibiting but obscure traces of granular texture, are frequently met with in these subterranean clefts, as well as connecting with the various strata in over- lying or proximate masses, and sometimes even in- tervening the earth. These masses, denominated by geologists trap rocks, and which are generally allow- ed to be of volcanic origin, have afforded no small portion of the ammunition which has been expended in the disputes between those who assign an aqueous, and those who contend for the igneous, formation of the strata composing the present crust of our planet. But, to return to rents : these spaces are divided by Mr. Longmire into ovalar, cylindrical, straight and bended-tabular shapes. These latter are the most ordinarily occurring dislocations, and when found to contain earthy tabular masses, and metallic and earthy crystals, are known by the appellations of slips, dykes, shifts, lodes, troubles, and faults. They are denominated slips, by some geological writers, be- cause the strata on one of their sides have slipped from those on the other, and fallen below them They are known at Whitehaven and elsewhere by the name of dykes, because they divide the seams, or bands of coal, as they are sometimes called, into fields ; and they are called up-throw or donmthrow dykes, as the edge of the strata appears to an observer to be higher or lower in regard to his own position. They are called shijis in some parts of England and Scofland, as they are considered by the majority of miners in these parts to have shifted the strata on their sides. In Cornwall, they are denominated cross lodes, or, when round or ovalar, pipe veins ; and in some parts of the kingdom they are called

160 Dislocations Of Strata.

troubles, ovfautls, from tlieir troubling, or putting to fault, tlie pitmen ; or the latter term maj hare arisen fvQva the supposition that the rents have been occa- sioned from something faulty in the aggregation of the matter of the rocks themselves. The subjoined diagram, which will strikingly illustrate the disloca- Fig. la

tions in question, is from a splendid section, on a laige scale, presented by Mr. Buddie to the Natural History Society of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, in which neighbourhood (at Jarrow) the portion of coal mea- sures thus singularly broken up, occurs.

We mentioned in the preceding Chapter, that the chai of level in the same strata sometimes exceeds 500 feet. This amazing dislocation, indeed, ipears almost trifling, when compared with the great south sUp in the Clackmannanshire coal field, which, ac- cording to Mr. Bald, throws down the strata no less than 1330 feet; the north slip in the same field throwing it down 700 feet. These fissures extend from the surface of the strata, or rock-head, some- times to an unknown depth ; they vary in width from a fiiaction of an inch to four or five yards, or more. Their descent is sometimes nearly vertical, but more

UP-THOW AND DOWN-THROW DkES. 161

coiamoDly they are oblique; the north slip above mentioned makes an angle witli the horizon of about 60 degrees. The Saltern north dyke, near White- haven, has been ascertained to descend more than 55 yards in an angular direction. It may be interesting to remark, that, however naturally it might have been expected that where subterranean disturbances had been effected on so vast a scale, the surface of the ground should exhibit some corresponding indicar tions, this is found not to be the case ; and even im- mense beds of marl, limestone, &c. sometimes overlie these dislocated tracts, presenting no traces of frac- ture. Indeed, not only do the alluvial and solid coverings often bear no relation to the dip or disrup- tion of the subjacent strata ; but it frequently hi4)pen8 that the ground ov some very considerable disloca- tions appears rnarkably level and undisturbed.

Although up-thronm and donm4kronmy as being rdative terms, convey no precise idea when used generally, yet there is a sense in which they are practically understood by pitmen ; for with regard to slips in coal fields, we find there is a general law connected with them as to the position of the dislo- cated strata. Suppose a slip is met with in the course of working horizontally in a mine — if, when looking at it, the vertical line of the fissure forms an acute angle with the line of the pavement upon which the observer stands, we are certain that the strata ane thrown downwards upon the other side of the slip. On the contrary, if the angle formed by the two linjes above mentioned is obtuse, we are certain the strata are thrown upwards on the other side of the fissure. When the ane is 90, or a right angle, it is altoge- ther uncertain whether the dislocation throws up or

M

162 Dislocations Of Strata,

down on the (posite side of the slip. When what are commonly called dykes intersect the strata, they generally only separate the portions, without any dislocation either up or down ; so that if a coal seam is intercepted by a dyke, it is found again, by run- ning a gallery direcdy forward, corresponding to the angle or inclination of the coal with the horizon.

It is justly observed by the author of an interesting work,f that one of the most remarkable features on a geolO'gical map of England is the line of the great trap dyke from beyond Cockfield Fell, in Durham, to the Smeaton Moors in Yorkshire, a distance of sixty miles, inclosing throughout its length a sub- terranean wall of basalt varying from thirty to sixty feet thick. This dyke, the longest known, resembles in composition and appearance, and is supposed to be united towards the west with, the Great Whin Sill," or basaltic formation of Upper Teesdale.

There are several considerable dislocations of strata in the coal fields of Northumberland and Durham ; the most celebrated of these is called the Main, or Great Dyke, or Ninety-fathom Dyke. The latter name has been given to it because the beds on the northern side are 90 fathoms lower than those on the southern side of it; its underlie is inconsiderable. In some places its width is not great ; but in Mon- tagu colliery it is 22 yards wide, and is filled with hard and soft sandstone. This dyke is visible in a quarry at Cullercotes, a little to the north of Tyne- mouth J from whence it traverses the coal strata in ihe direction of N.N.E. and S.S.W. past Crawcrook, a distance of sixteen miles, and probably passes into the formations imderlying the coal measures. From

If emoin Wem. Soc. vol. iii. p. 134. f PhiUips* Geol. Yorkt. p. 179.

Section Of Whin Dyke. 163

the southern side of this dyke, two others branch off, one to the S.E., the other to the S.W. The latter is called from its breadth the Seventy-yard Dyke and, like the main one, is filled by a body of hard and soft sandstone: it intersects the upper seam of coal, which it appears is not thrown out of its level by the interruption. The seam, however, de- creases in thickness firom the distance of 15 or 16 yards -, there the coal first becomes sooty, and at length assumes the appearance of coke — phenomena un- known, except in the vicinity of basaltic dykes. The south-eastern branch is only 20 yards in breadth.

Fig. 19.

The above diagram exhibits a section of tlie great slip as it cuts a portion of the coal field near Newcastle ; and also of the intersecting Whin Dyke, the central portion of which consists of basalt, sixteen feet in thickness.

A A. The Nmet7-&thom Dyke, of unknown depth.

B B B. The Whin Dyke, extending underground in an undu- lating course, from Coley Hill, 6, in a N. W. direction to Simond- side, towards the S.E., heyond the right extremity of thediagram, a distance of ahout eleven miles.

C C. The High Main coal.— D D. The Low Main coal.— £ £. The Beaumont seam. — F F F. Level of the river Tyne. — H. Benwell coUieiy. — Newcastle town Moor.

Mr. Farey has described f a striking arrangement

Intiod. Geol. part i., p. 376. f Phil. Tnins. 1811. p. 242.

M 2

164 Dislocations Of Strata.

of faults, extending into the counties of Derby, Staf- ford, Nottingham, Chester, and York, and surround- ing in its laiest scope an immense tract, within which two other portions are successiTelj still farther raised, the innermost immediately surrounding the town of Bakewell, which indeed is situate towards the centre of this singarly lifted district. As the strata thus raised have also become, owing to various causes, completely exposed or uncovered in high situations, the whole tract, from the county in which the greater part of it lies, has been designated by Mr. Farey " the great Derbyshire denudation." This phenomenon, let it be remembered, presents no ano- maly as viewed in connection with the statement previously made relative to the non-coincidence of the alluvial covering with the displacement of sub- jacent strata. In Somersetshire, coal measures, highly inclined, lie beneath, and are concealed by, horizontal beds of red marl ; and in the same country great faults, which elevate the coal seams seventy yards, produce not an inch of displacement in the superincumbent matter. And examples are well known in Yorkshire, where inclined coal measures are covered by nearly horizontal magnesian lime- stone, which is unbroken by the vast dykes and faults in the subjacent coal.* As might be expected the basaltic rock, when occupjring these fissures, has, on account of its extreme hardness, been less wasted by diluvial and atmospherical changes, than the softer strsLta which bound it ; and, therefore, in some places it appears above them in a long crust or lidge, or ranges along the moors like an alicielit military road, and even in some places stands up in a lofty wall.f

PhiUips* Geology of Yorkshire, p. 15. f Ibid.

Proofs Of Igneous Action. 165

The contents of these fissures, as already noticed, comprise not only mixed matters evidently the detri- tus of the strata through which they pass, but sand- stone, and the more peculiar formations of basalt and toadstone, to which it seems difficult to deny an ig- neous origin, or to doubt that it has been ejected from below, or forcibly intruded into the strata. It must be added, however, that these latter substances are not unfrequently accompanied in the coal measures with very unequivocal traces of the operation of fire. In most instances the edges of strata, where the faults cut them, are affected in density at least, and gene, rally the rocks, or those portions of them adjacent to trap dykes, have assumed a greater degree of indura- tion; loose grits have passed into compact quartz rock, and clay or shale into flinty slate, or in some instances into a compact substance called porcelain Jasper. The coal is found completely charred, or converted into coke, of an ash-grey colour, and po- rous, having the fracture, and in other respects re- sembling that produced by distillation in close vessels at the gas and coal-tar works. In Northumberland, one working exhibits the coal thus affected at a spot where it is 18 feet thick on one side, and 9 feet thick

As the Whin Dyke, previously described, does not pass through the Beanaont ool seam, Mr. Buddie, from whom the particulvs are deriTed, poBsiders that this and other fiftcts shew it to be an exception to the generally leoeived opinion, that whin dykes hare been formed by the basalt in a state of fusion haring always been forced upward through the fissures, in the stiatiiication from below, and that they extend to an indefinite depth. It is also doubtful whether those basaltic fissures, which occur in various parts of tiie Newoastle coal field, run through the strata in uninterrupted and conti- nuous lines. Tram. Nai. BisL Soc. Newautle. 1880.— Mr. Hutton considers High Teesdale to mark, as it Fere, a centre of volcanic action, from a crater In which the basalt of the great dykes of Durham and Yorkshire may have ilowed, aa they appear to spring from hence as from a focus, which had con- tinued in activity at difierent periods up to one even beyond the consolidation of the oolitic series. Tram. Nai. Hut. Soc. Newcastle, ii. 212.

Dislocations Of Strata.

on the other side of the dyke, which is here filled with a vein of basalt 13 feet thick. At Cockfield Fell, in Yorkshire, where the coal near the dyke is converted into a black substance like concreted soot, in the stratum above the cinder a great deal of sulphur is sometimes found, in angular forms, of a bright jeUow colour, and very beautiful." It may be farther re- marked, that the sandstone adjoining this substance is found changed to some depth to a brick-red colour; and even limestone is often rendered highly crystal- line, and unfit for lime, when in the vicinity of this rock.

" Dykes," says Mr. Conybeare, " are an endless source of difficulty and expense to the coal-own, throwing the seams out of their levels, and filling the mines with water and fire-damp. At the same time they are not without their use ; when veins are filled, as is often the case, with stiff clay, numerous springs are dammed up, and brought to the surface ; and by means of those dykes which throw down the strata, valuable beds of coal are preserved within the field, which would otherwise have cropped out, and been lost altogether. Several valuable beds of coal would not now have existed in the country north of the main dyke [above described], but for the general de- pression of the beds occasioned by that chasm."

We shall close the present Chapter by an eloquent passage from the Inaugural Lecture published by Professor Buckland, in which that learned geologist adverts in a striking manner to the beneficial bearing in the economy of the earth, of those numerous dis- locations so generally misnamed faults, of which we have been ti*eating. After adducing some of those

Introd. Gcol. part i. p. 377.

Buckland On Faults. 167

various illustrations in proof of admirable contrivance in the structure of the globe, with which investiga- tions into its fossil and mineral contents bring us acquainted, the Reverend expositor proceeds : Thus rlogy contributes proofs to Natural Theology strictly In harmony with those derived from other branches of Natural History ; and if it be allowed, on the one hand, that these proofs are, in this science, less nume- rous and obvious, it may be contended, on the other, that they are calculated to lead us a step farther in our inferences. The evidences afforded by the sister sciences exhibit, indeed, the most admirable proofs of design and intelligence originally exerted at the Crep> ation : but many who admit these proofs still doubt the continued superintendance of that intelligence, maintaining that the system of the universe is carried on by the force of the laws originally impressed on matter, without the necessity of fresh interference or continued supervision on tlie part of the Creator. Such an opinion is indeed founded only on a verbal fallacy ; for ' laws impressed on matter' is an expres- sion, which can only denote the continued exertion of the will of the Lawgiver, the Prime Agent, the First Mover : still, however, the opinion has been entertained; and perhaps it nowhere meets with a more direct and palpable refutation, than is afforded by the subserviency of the present structure of the earth to final causes ; for that structure is evidently the result of many and violent convulsions subsequent to its original formation. When, therefore, we per- ceive that the secondary causes producing these con- vulsions have operated at successive periods, not blindly and at random, but with a direction to bene ficial ends, we see at once the proofs of an overruling

168 DiSLOCATIONS OF STRATA.

Intelligence continuing to superintend direct, modifvy and controul the operation of the agents which He originally ordained.

Examples of this kind are perhaps nowhere more strikingly afforded than in the instance of Hiose frac- tures or distuihances cslledfaultSf which occur in the alternating beds of coal, slaty clay, and sandstone, which are usually associated imder the name of coal measures. The occurrence of such faults and the inclined position in which the strata composing the coal measures are usually laid out, are facts of the highest importance as connected with the accessibility of their mineral contents. From their inclined post- tion, the thin strata of coal are worked with greater facility than if tliey had been horizontal ; but as tins I inclination has a tendency to plunge their lower ex- i tremities to a depth that would be inaccessible, a : series of faults, or traps, is interposed, by which the component portions of the same formation axe ar- ranged in a series of successive tables, or stages, 'rising one behind the other, and elevated continually upwards towards the surface from their lowest points I of depression. A similar effect is often produced by undulations of the strata, which give the united ad- vantage of inclined position, and of keeg them near the surface. The basin-shaped structure, which ' so frequently occurs in coal fields, has a similar t- dency to produce the same beneficial effect.

But a still more important benefit results from f the occurrence of faults or fractures without which the contents of no deep coal mine would be accessible. Had the strata of shale and gritstone that alternate with the beds of coal been continuously united with- out fractm-e, the quantity of water that would have

Advantages Of Faults* 160

penetrated fitim the suiroundiiig country into any eoiisideral>le excavations tbat miglkt have been made in the porous grit beds, would have been insuperable by the powers of the most improved machineiy: whereas, by the simple arrangement of a system of faults, the water is admitted only in such quantities as are within contronl. Thus the component strata of a coal field are divided into numberless insulated masses or sheets of rock, of irregular form and area, not one of which is continuous in the same plane over -any very laie district, but each is separated from its next adjacent mass, or sheet, by a dam of clay impe* netraide to water, filling L nurow ca dnced by the fracture which caused the fault.

If we suppose a thick sheet of ice to be broken into fragments of irregular area, and these fragments again united after receiving a slight dree of irre- .gukr inclination to the plane of the original sheet, the united fragments of ice will represait the appear- ance of the component portions of the broken masses, <fr sheets, of coal measures we are describing, whilst those intervening portions of more recent ice by which 'diey are held together, represent the clay and rub- faUdi that fill the faults, and form the partition walls that insulate these adjacent portions of strata, which were originally formed like the sheet of ice in one continuous plane. Thus each sheet or inclined table coal measures is inclosed by a system of more or less vertical walls of broken day, derivative fit>m its argSlaceous iale beds at the moment in which the fiwctnre and dislocation took place : and hence have resulted tiiose joints and separations, wludi, though they occasionally interrupt at inconvenient positions, and cut ofi* suddenly the progress of the collier, and

170 Dislocations Of Strata.

ojften shatter those portions of the strata that are in y immediate contact with them yet are in the main his greatest safeguard, and indeed essential to his opera- tions. The same faults also, whilst they prevent the water from flowing in excessiye quantities in dtua. tions where it would be detrimental, are at the same time of the greatest service in converting it to pur- poses of utility, by creating on the surface a series of springs along the line of feiult, which often give notice of the fracture that has taken place beneath. It may be added also, that the faults of a coal field, by inter- rupting the continuity of the respective beds of coal, and causing their truncated edges to abut against those of uninflammable strata of shale or grit, afford a preservative which prevents the ravages of acci- dental fire from extending beyond the area of that sheet in which it may take its beginning, but which, without the intervention of some such a provision might lead to the destruction of entire coal fields.

" It is impossible," concludes Dr. BucMand, to contemplate a disposition of things so well accommo- dated, and indeed so essential to the various uses which the materials of the earth are calculated to afford to the industry of its inhabitants, and even to the supply of some of their first wants, and entirely to attribute such a system to the blind operation of fortuitous causes. Although it be indeed dangerous hastily to introduce final causes, yet since it is evi- dent that in many branches of physical knowledge, more especially those which relate to all oianized matter, the final causes of the subjects with which they are conversant form perhaps that part of them which lies most obviously open to our cognizance, it would surely be as unphilosophical to scruple at the

Advantages Of Faults. 171

admission of these causes when the general tenor and evidence of the phenomena natorally suggest them, as it would be to introduce them gratuitously unsup- ported by such evidence. We may surely, ttierefore, feel ourselves authorised to view, in the geological arrangement above described, a system of wise and benevolent contrivances prospectively subsidiary to the wants and comforts of the future inhabitants of the globe, and extending itself onwards, firom its first formation through all the subsequent revolutions and convulsions that have affected the surface of our planet.**

Chapter Ix.

Boring And Sinking.

Relative Viervs of the Miner and the Geologist in searching for Coal — Extent and localities of car- boniferous strata mostly ascertained — Superficial indications of Coal — Examination by boring — Description of boring apparatus — Interesting nature of the search after mineral treasures — Sizes of pits — Windlass used in commencement of sinking — Walling inside the shaft — Tubbing — Blasting with gunpowder — Description of the horse gin — Ex- pensiveness of sinking deep pits — Pemberton's shaft at Monkwearmouth — Adits or drifts.

JllAVING disposed of the Natural History and geological relations of coal, we now come to treat of its obtainment by means of human industry. How- ever attractive coal might have been or may be con- sidered, as a mere fossU, to scientific enquirers into the nature and formation of the earth, it is mainly to considerations connected with its importance as the most valuable species of fuel, that we owe our so large and generally accurate acquaintance with its properties and situation. For, let the zeal of the geologist be what it may in pushing scientific inves-

Searching For Coal. 173

titions over varioiis countries to a great extent,, or to whatever depths in the earth on a given spot, the practical self-interest of the coUier will rarely fail to surpass it in exploring any locality where coal is likely to be found. These parties, indeed, are noti conunonly found proceeding in concert, at least, the latter has only been induced of late years to defer to the former in reference to strictly untried ground ; and perhs the advantages which would arise fitom .. the working of thick seams of good coal, sufficiently ; account for the many unsuccessful attempts to dis- ! cover them. The opinions of working colliers on ' this point,'" observes Mr. Phillips,* have too often been preferred to the legitimate deductions of science; and even yet persons will perhaps be found willing to credit the delusive tale o( finding good coal by. jfcinff deeper.'

Formerly, the absurd and arbitrary notion that coal might be found any where in this Island by only sinking deep enough, prevailed to a considerable extent. Men of the present generation residing in or about London, may have heard tiieir grandmothers gravely assert that coal might be raised from under iMackheath, and other equally unlikely places, were it not that Government did not allow the search lest the discovery might interfere with that " nursery for seamen,'* the coast coal trade ! It is allowed by experienced geologists, that workable coal may here- after be discovered in some new situations or at great depths ; as, for instance, covered by magnesian lime-** stone or red sandstone, or beneath the lias, as Ae coal measures of Durham and Western Yorkshire, appear in some instances to run under these sub-

♦ Geology of Yorkshire, p. 182.

174 Boring And Sinking.

stances ; but this is very uncertain. Indeed, within the last thirty years, there has been disseminated such accurate and extended knowledge of the state of the coal districts, and of the associated strata of the island generally, as to render it much less probable that unknown seams exist to any great amount, than might have been supposed at an ante- cedent period. Before the publication of the geo- logical map of England by Mr. Smith, and of another by Mr. Greenhough, to say nothing of various local surveys, there existed hardly any general information on this subject ; and an opinion, as already stated, prevailed, tiiat coal might be found, at certain depths, almost as certainly in one county as in another. But the experience of scientific observers, as Dr. Buckland remarked, in his Evidence before the House of Commons, who have united the results obtained from their own observations with the con- elusions of practical men, shews that we now know almost minutely the extent of all those districts in which coal can possibly exist in England.

In those situations where the outcrop of the coal has been bared, either accidentally or by natural causes, or in the vicinity of well known coal fields, the chances of meeting with seams may, in most

It does not appear that the Tirgula diTinatonim, or divining rod, at one time in such estimation with oar tin and lead miners, was ever in use among the colliers of this conntiy, though to its use has been attributed the disoo- Tery of coal in France. This kind of coaUy stone," says Schoock after Guicciardin, was discovered in the district of Liege, a.d. 1189, by a certain pilgrim, who, when he had pointed them out by a divining rod to a smith, suddenly disappeaied ; afterwards they began to be dug in great abundance." Morand tells us, in his Memoirs twr U Charhon de Terre, that the person who in the country of Liege first discovered them, is called Pmdhomme le Houillouz;' or le Veillard Charbonnier," Hullasus FleneTallium " ; that is, the collier or blacksmith of Pleneyaoz," a village within two leagues and a half of Liege.

Indications Of Coal. 176

cases, be easily calculated. In the districts on the Tyne and Wear, not only are sections of coal-basins exposed in the sides of rallies, but the basset-edges of the measures used formerly to be broken up in considerable quantities by the wheeb of carts passing over them. In the Yorkshire coal-field, the out- burst of the coal may frequently be noticed ; and there may at this time be seen in the western suburb of the town of Sheffield, so large a surface of coal uncovered during the making of one or two new streets, that not only were the bricks of which many of the houses have been built, made of clay got out of the cellars, and burnt with the coal dug on the same spot, but the latter, although of a tender and indifferent quality, continues to be sold and carted away in considerable quantity. To persons remote from the colliery districts — and, indeed, to many others, the appearance of an acre or two of coal lying exposed in situ on a level with the street, must be a novel sight.

It is only, however, in some situations, and under particular circumstances, that denuded strata present themselves ; hence, one chief difficulty which arises in exploring a country in search of coals, or even where coal fields are known to exist, arises from the great thickness of alluvial cover, which completely hides the crop or outburst of the strata, termed gene- nerally by miners the rock-head, from our view, and also completely conceals the fissures, dykes, and dis- locations of the strata, which produce such material alterations in the coal fields, and are frequently the occasion of great loss to the mining adventurer. The alluvial cover has been compared, in reference to the strata which exist underneath, to the flesh upon the

176 Boring And Sinking.

bones in animals : if the flesh is removed, the whole stracture of the bones, their situation and connection, are at once discovered ; in the same manner, were the alluvia] covering removed, the whole strata would be distinctly seen, and the effect of every dislocation immediately ascertained. But, however the total re- moval of Ihe alluvial cover might, in one view, ap- pear to be of great advantage, as affording facility in ascertaining the mineral contents of any district, yet this convenience would be greatly outweighed by the disadvantages, not only in the loss of soil at present available for purposes of cultivation, but likewise in consequence of the strata being denuded, the coal- mines would be deluged during every rainy season ; whereas the alluvial cover affords protection, by caus- ing the water to flow along the surface till it joins the rivers, which are the great natural drains £6r the moisture on the surface of the earth.

The usual, and most certain, method of ascertain- ing the mineral contents of any given spot, whatever be the superficial indications, or proximate circum- stances of it, is by Boring. This process determines at once and satisfactorily, and at comparatively little cost, the order of the different substances, from the surface to any given depth ; also the exact thickness of each stratum at the place of section, and conse- quently affords the best data not only as to the actual existence of coal, but with reference to how far it may be of a kind, or lie in seams* sufficiently thick, or at such depth, as may justify the sinking of a shaft, the erection of enginery, and the general working of the bed or beds. The following sketch is a representa>* tion of the apparatus for boring, as commonly con- structed.

Boring Apparatus.

A spot being fixed upon, the first object of die worianen is to obtain a stout springing pole a, which is twelve or fourteen yards in length, and generallj, where practicable, nuide of a tree fresh felled and bongh-Iopped for the purpose. It is securely fastened down at the thick end, a short distance from which it rests upon the prop or bearer B. Near the small end, a wooden stare is passed through, affording convenient hand-hold for two men, when standing on the stage c. Over this stage, and also exactly over the spot where the boring is to take place, a triangle D, is erected, consisting of three poles fastened at the apex, and sustaining a pully-block and rope — the latter attached to the windlass E. The use of this tackle wis presently appear. A flooring of planks, F G, is then laid down, having a hole in the centre through which the rods are to work. Hiese rods H K, are of iron, four feet long, an inch in diameter, and tapped with good screws at their ends, which are made somewhat swelling out to give strength. The lowermost rod, or that which in boring actually operates upon the rock or other stratum, is a sort of chisel, K ; the uppermost terminates in a stout ring, through which ptisses the cross-piece L, and which, in working, is taken hold of by two men : it is also

178 Boring And Sinking.

suspended to the sprmging*pole bj a chain. One of tiie rods is formed at the end with a shell like a common auger, and is used for the purpose of bring- ing up at intervals portions of the detritus produced by the action of the chisel. The mode of operation is as follows :— one, or more rods being pushed into the ground, through the hole in the planks, the two men on the stage, taking hold of the cross-stave at the end of the springing-pole, work it steadily up and down ; while the two men below, by means of the cross-piece, simultaneously heave and depress the suspended rods, walking at the same time skwly round the hole — by these combined operations of chopping and scooping, making way through what- ever substance may be in contact with the steel chisel of the lowest rod. When the boring becomes some- what obstructed by the accumulation of wreck , as the workmen call the mine stuff produced by the workijig of the chisel, or when they wish to ascertain what stratum they are passing through, the rods are drawQ out by means of the tackle above described, the chisel is unscrewed off, and replaced by the shell, which is then lowered to extract the loose matter for deaiage and examination, m is the spanner used* in screwing and unscrewing the rods; and N an iron fork, the prongs of which are placed across the rods below the swell, and in contact with the floor, to prevent the lower series from slipping down, while the ujr one is being screwed off or on.

The chisel so(mest becomes clogged, and the tire- some operation of withdrawing the rods, is required to be repeated most frequently, when the .stratum is somewhat soft and dry ; on the other hand, the boring goes on most pleasantly for the workmen, when a

Process Of Investigation. 179

strong spring of water is tapped, as this generaUy overflowing, brings xqf with it to tiie orifice, every particle of tlie wreck as it is produced. The diameter of these borings is commonly from 2i to 5 inches — rarely so much as the latter.

By this method, the stratification below any given plot of ground, is esLamined at a trifling expense, and with considerable precision. Williams, in his quaint style, has pourtrayed the pleasure attending these investigations — when successful: — all branches of business," says he, of all the experi- mentB that a man of sensibility can be employed in, or attend to, there is perhaps none so amusing, so engaging, and delightful, as a successful trial upon the vestigia or appearances of a seam of coal or other mineral discoveries. When you are attending the people who are digging down or forward upon the vestige of the coal, and the indications are increasing and still growing better under your eye, the spirit of curiosity and attention is awakened, and all the powers of expectation are elevated in pleasing hopes of success ; and when your wishes are at length actually crowned with success, when you have dis- covered a good coal of sufficient thickness, and that all circumstances are favourable, the heart then triumphs in the accomplishment of its wishes with solid and satisfactory joy. There is more rational delight, more substantial pleasure and happiness, to be enjoyed in such scenes as this, than in all the celebrated amtlsements which luxury invents and pur- sues." He should have added that the mortifications attendant on disappointment are often proportionably trying.

Having ascertained the existence, and workable

N 2

180 Boring And Sinking.

condition of coal, by means of boring or otherwise, the next business is the sinking of the shaft. This work, as well as the preceding, is not undertaken by the regular colliers, but by a separate class of men called sinkers. In the northern collieries the pits are invariably circular, and varying in their diameters from six to twelve feet. It is common to divide the .very deep shafts by a brattice or boarded partition from top to bottom, the use of which will afterwards appear — in these cases, the diameter is usually from 8 to 10 feet: sometimes the shaft is divided into three parts, and then it is generally from 10 to 12 feet across ; from 6 to 8 feet is a regular size where no brattice is intended. In Yorkshire, Staffordshire, and other places; where the distances between the surface to the coal are inconsiderable as compared with those about Newcastle, it is common to sink, of the smaller size, separate shafts for pumping, ven- tilating, and drawing the coals : occasionally, too, the pits for the latter purpose are oval in their form.

The situation, form, and size of the pit being de- termined, operations are commenced by digging out the soil to a proper extent, and then erecting a windlass, called in some places stowses, or tumsUJces. This very ancient mining apparatus is generally known : it consists of two upright cheeks resting on cross pieces, and cut at the upper end of each, for the reception of the iron axes of a roller, having a stout winch handle, exactly similar to that seen over most draw-wells : upon this roller the rope is wound* At the end of the rope is the large iron hook made with a catch, to prevent it from slipping off the bow of the corve or tub used in drawing up the materials. The tubs, which were formerly used, have now

Cribbing And Walling. 181

mosdj given way to large WTonght iron buckets placed upon soles shod with iron in the manner of a sledge, that thej may be dragged along with the greater ease by means of a hooked rod and cross- piece, or handle* The ordinary tools of the sinker are, mattocks, gavelock, a sledge haamier twenty pounds weight, and several short stout wedges; also a smaller hammer, long chisels, and an iron skewer for setting shots.

After the sinking has proceeded some yards, more or less according to the nature of the strata excava- ted, it is necessary to commence operations for secu- ring the whole interior of the shaft— except in very solid parts — by means of a lining of brick. This cylindrical wall, or gingingy is raised upon a circular frame-woik of wood called a crib, and which is itself made to rest, where practicable, upon a rocky or other solid ledge ; or, where the matter passed through is loose, those timbers which support the brick-work are themselves upheld by keys driven into the sides of the pit, or even suspended by chains from the top. Hie sinking is then resumed, and, in due course, another circuit of cribbing is laid, and a section of walling carried up, till it joins the lower part of the preceding fabric. These operations and precautions are repeated at intervals, more or less frequently according to the nature of the strata ; the rocky por- tions do not always require such support. In order to secure that the shaft be regular in circumference, and accurate in perpendicular descent, a plumb-line is occasionally suspended from the top to the bottom, and the distance of the sides from centre — gene- rally about five feet — measured by means of a stick kept for the purpose. All this is easily done when

182 Boring And Sinking.

the pit is circular, which is most common, or square, which rarely occurs ; but when oval, as is sometimes the case, the measurement, having to be made from three centres, is more difficult ; and accordingly the sinkers pride themselves, when they can work with perfect accuracy under the latter circumstances.

When the substances passed through prove dry, the work proceeds without difficulty; but when water occurs, as is generally the case, and spouting, as it sometimes does, from several points of the circum- ference of the excavation, it is no easy matter to manage either the above-mentioned erection, or the sinking, satisfactorily. Means, however, are taken, generally by oblique gutters cut behind the wall, or by the fixing of boards to conduct the streams to the floor, when it is either laded out into the bucket with the stuff dug up, or, if very abundant, sent out in an eighteen-gallon tub, lowered alternately with the bucket In some instances, the interior o( the shaft, when the water cannot be stopped or diverted suffi- ciently by the brick lining, is &rther cased with boards nailed from one crib to another. These sur- rounding spouts in the Staffordshire pits are called garhnd circles : in some shafts there are not fewer than six or eight of these garland circles, by means of which the side water is collected and carried by an inclined drift or bore to the engine-pit.

In the pits about Newcastle, and elsewhere, when great durability and firmness are aimed at, as well as an effectual means of keeping out the water, re- quired at whatever expense, this casing of the inte- rior with wood is very substantially effected. It is called tubbing. The earliest application of the sys- tem of lining shafts mth wood, ftt)m which the appel-

TUBBING THE SHAfT. 183

lalioB of tubbing seems to bave been derived, was tbe spikii of 2h or 3-ipch planks (properly dressed to tbe swe of the pit) to cribs or supports of 6 or 8 inches square, placed at intervals of 2 or 3 feet Witb this description of tubbing was effected tbe win* ning of Hebbum, Jarrow, South Shields, and other collieries in the neighbourhood of Newcastle, about and since the year 1 790 ; in which collieries some of these tubs are sustaining water under a pressure of 40 fathops, or 100 lbs. per square inch.

About the year 1795, the late Mr. Barnes at the King Pit, Walker CoUiery, on the .Tyne, introduced cast-iron tabbing, c<msist|ng o( entire circular lims the size of the shaft ; these were found exceedingly convenient in passing through sand and other loose mattCT, especially near the surface. The improve* ment, however, which has given to this kind of secu* rity its full convenience and efficiency, was the plan of casting Ihe metal cylinder in segments adopted by Mr. Buddie, in the winning of Percy Main Colliery in 1 796. In the cast iron work of this intelligent in- dividual, to whose scientific and professional exertions the mining district about Newcastle is indebted for so many of its greatest improvements, the flanches were bolted together and projected inside towards the centre of the pit. This inconvenience was removed, and cast iron tubbing carried apparently to its limit f .aM .pplicaon! when .% wi adoptea for putting the segments together without screw bolts at

It mfty not be oninterMtiBg here to mentioxi that Mr. Baddle has pre- ented to the Nataral History Society of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, the various plans, sections, and written documents accumulated by him through a long period of professional experience, as one of the most intelligent and respec- table Gosl newers in that district : he has also suggested to the Society the

propriety of making a collection of mining records, according to a plan which

laid dowxL i

184 Boring And Sinking.

all) in the winning of Howden Pit in 1805, since which time this method has been universally adopted. Mr. Buddie mentions one instance in his experience, where, in sinking a shaft he had occasion to insert forty fatiioms of iron tubbing ; at that depth the strata became impervious to water.

In order to break up such rocky masses, as cannot be separated by the gavelock, recourse is had to blasting, a somewhat dangerous but highly effective agency. In setting a shot," as the miners term it, the first operation is the making of a hole in the solid substance of the stone ; this is done by a succession of strokes upon the head of a long stout chisel held in the hand of the workmen, and turned about, as in the method of boring before described. The hole is of a triangar shape, about two inches in diameter, and thirty inches deep— more or less, according to the thickness of the substance in which it is made. The direction of the bore, and position of the angles in relation to the matter to be detached, are of im- portance, and can be so adapted by experienced sinkers as to enable them to form in general, a very accurate estimate of the effect of the explosion. If the hole be too shallow, the shot will merely rive away a superficial portion of the rock; if, on the other hand, it be sunk nearly through the mass, it will burst downward, and spend itself among the interstices of the stratum. After the hole is bored, it is charged with gunpowder, to the depth of several inches : a long " pricker" or skewer is then put down in one of the angles, and filled about with marl, or such stuff as may be at hand; this is rammed with an iron rod, care being taken not to strike a spark from the adjacent materials— from which occurrence

Blastikg — Horse Oin. 189

dreadful accidents have sometiineB luppened. When Has part of the operation U finished, the pricker is withdrawn, and a wheaten straw filled with powder, and to the top of which a dip of touch-paper, or paper merely greased, is stuck with a bit of clay, is inserted : a light is then applied, and the miner is drawn up as quickly as possible. It is the practice, sometimes, instead of inserting the fuze, to cover the hole with gunpowder, scattering at the same time a considerable qnautity orer the pit bottom, upon which fire is thrown from above : this slovenly and wasteful plan was exclusively in use half a century ago.

When the sinking has proceeded to snch a depth that the labour of drawing np the matter by means of the windlass becomes exceedingly great, a machine called a gin is generally set np, the stones and rub- hish already brought up being used in the formation of what is called the gin-Tace, or circular track in which the horse attached to the machine travels. The following is a representation of the gin, which

Fig. SI.

was the most perfect contrivance for drawing coals and water out of the mine previonsly to the intro- ductiou of the steam-engine : it is still extensively

186 Boring Anb Sinking.

used in many small concerns, wkere the produce does not justify the erection of a more expensire apparatus.

A, the head-gear, consisting of two upright posts tn which wheels are fixed, and oyer which those por* tions of the rope to which the buckets are attached pass into the pit B, a drum, or short wooden cylin- der, about five or six yards in diameter, upon which the rope winds : this drum has a vertical shaft, to a cross-pieee of which at c, the horse is attached ; its lower end rests in a socket on the ground, and is supported above by the transverse beam n, raised on standards at each end. The rope being wound about the gin, the horse is driven in one direction until one bucket is lowered to the bottom and the other raised to the surface — and then, by reversing his course, the latter bucket, having been emptied at the bank, is made to descend, and tlie other as filled below is drawn up*

The expense attendant upon sinking a shaft will depend, of course, a good deal upon the depth and nature of the strata requiring to be penetrated. Mr. Buddie states that in Northumberland, he has, in several cases, known a single pit, previously to its being worked, cost upwards of £70,000. Iliis sum included the machinery requisite for sinking tiie pit, namely, the steam-engine and all its apparatus ; but as this was merely to get at the coal, it may be con- ndered as a winning charge, rather than a working charge. The deepest pit with which the gentieman above named was acquainted, as a working pit, was 180 fathoms of shaft ; the shallowest 23 fathoms ; but the pitmen sometimes descend much deeper by means of inclined planes under ground.

Monkwearmouth Collirry. 187

The shaft at present ranking at Monkweannouth CoUieiy, near Sunderland, has attained a consider- ablj greater dqpih than any mine in Grreat Britain, (or estimating its depth from the level of the sea, than any mine in the world.) It was commenced in May, 18!26. The upper part of the pit is sunk through the lower magnesion limestone strata, which overlap the south-eastern district of the Great New- castle Coal-field, and which, including a stratum* of freestone sand'* at the bottom of the limestone, ex- tended at Monkweannouth, to the thickness of 330 feet, and discharged towards the bottom of the strata the prodigious quantity of 3000 gallons of water per minute, — for the raising of which into an off-take drift, a double-acting steam-engine, woridng with a power of from 180 to 200 horses, was found neces- sary. The first unequivocal stratum of the coal for- mation, viz., a bed of coal inches thick, was not reached till August, 1831, (being about 344 feet be- low the surface,) after which the tremendous influx of water which had so long impeded the sinking operations was stopped back'' by the metal tubbing which extended from the above bed of coal to within 26 jzxds of the surface. The sinking now proceeded with spirit — still, no valuable bed of coal was reached, although the shaft had passed considerably above 600 feet into the coal measures, and much deeper than had hitherto been found requisite for readiing some of the known seams. It became evident that the miners Were in unknown ground. A new " feeder" of water was encountered at the great depth of 1000 feet, re- fuiring fresh ptimps and a fresh outlay of money. Ilie prospects of the owners became unpromising in the eyes of most men, and were denounced as hope-

188 Boring And Sinking.

less by many of the coal-viewers Coal-viewing, however, had as yet been limited to some 200 or 220 fathoms ; and the views of the Messrs. Pemberton (the enterprising owners of this colliery) were not to be bounded by such ordinary depths; they consi- dered that the thickness of the coal formation might be vastly greater where protected by the super-incum- bent limestone, than where exposed to those denuda- tions which, in the neighbourhood of the " rise" col- lieries, had probably swept away the strata through which their own shaft had hitherto been sunk ; that they were, therefore, justified in anticipating the larger and known seams at greater depths ; and that, in case these larger seams had (as was intimated) been split into smaller strata, the same causes which in other places had produced their subdivision might, at Monkwearmouth, have effected their junction. They continued, therefore, their sinking, and in Oc- tober, 1834, reached a seam of considerable value and thickness, at the depth of 1578 feet below the surface ; and presuming that this newly discovered seam was identified with the Bensham seam of the Tyne, (or Maudlin seam of the Wear,) they are ra- pidly deepening their shaft, in anticipation of reach- ing the Hutton or most valuable seam, at no distant period, but which (if their anticipations are well founded) will be found at a depth approaching 300 £ftthoms fix>m the surface ! ! In the mean time, how- ever, workings havebeen commenced in the supposed Bensham seam, though not as yet carried to any great extent : and when only a few days before this sheet went to press (April 1835) the writer paid a visit to the pit, he found the sinking still going on,

narbam Advertiser.

Adits Or Water Drifts. 189

the depth reached being about 265 fathoms. The outlay of capital in this spirited undertaking has been immense — it is said not less than between £80,000 and £100,000.

As pertaining immediately to the province of the sinker may be mentioned the driiring of thirls, or adits, for the emission of water at what are called day4ev€k. This was a primitive method of draining coal in situ* ations which rendered the adoption of such an expe- dient available ; and espedaUy before the introduction of hydraulic machinery, or the steam engine. The particular mention of drijis to carry off the water, oc- curs, in connexion with die sinking of pits at Ferry- hill, in a lease to the Prior of Durham dated in 1354. The old Preston Grange Colliery near Edinburgh, abandoned in 1746 on account of being inundated, discharged 220 gallons per minute, by means of a drift, into the Frith of Forth. In South Wales the numerous deep valleys intersecting the coal country, afford many favourable opportunities for this kind of drainage : in general these adits are used as canals for bringing out the coals. Since the application of steam power in its most efficient forms, some gigantic undertakings for carrying off the water by day levels have been completed : the Cornish adit, for example, which drains about fifty mines, extending its ramifi- cations about 26,000 fathoms, or nearly thirty miles, is a prodigious work of this kind : it empties itself into the sea at Falmouth harbour. The adit of the Duke of Bridgewater's collieries at Worsley is about thirty miles long, and navigable for barges used in the ex- traction and transit of the coals. There are several others of great extent, and that have been the subject of enormous expense in different parts of the country, particularly in lead mining districts.

190 Boring And Sinking.

Few operations can be conceived more nnpleasant and dangerous to the workmen, than the execution of these adits, especially when, as is sometimes the case, they are barely wide enough to allow the sinker to creep along. The dangers which are created by blasting the solid rock with gpowder in such con- fined spaces, win be easily conceived : in the stillness of night the report of these caqplosions is sometimes heard to a distance of three or four miles ; and the writer of this recollects on one occasion to have heard tlie wife of an intrepid sinker describe the feelings with which, at midnight, she used to hear when in bed, the reverberation of every shot fired by her husband in his dangerous subterranean toil, at a distance of two miles at least.

Chapter X.

Working Machinery.

Drawing and air shajis— Importance ofVentUatim- Draining the Mine—Bearing of strata— Early contrivances for raising the water — Bucket wheels — Steam-engine — Boulton and Watt — Pumping appa ratus — Subterranean Steam-engines — Deep Pits divided by Bratticing — Head Gear — Wliimsey — Steam-engine and counterpoise — Hydraulic Machi- nery for raising Coals — Corves, Trams, Buckets, and Waggons — Screen — Entrance to Pits by Ca- nals and FootraUs.

A.SSUMIN6 in accordance with the preceding Chapter, that a shail is sunk to the coal, and properly secured against the irruption of loose shattery sand or gravel, as well as of water, by wood or iron tubbing, it is proper farther to state, that this shaft must either be liTided down the middle by a partition of boards, so as to fonn upcast and downcast tubes for ventilation, and, in some cases, to serve for enginepumps, as well as drawing coals ; or else, that another pit must be sunk, to be connected with the former by means of an underground drift, and afford a circulation of air. In very deep pits, the saving of expense

192 Working Machinery.

commonly compels the fonner course ; in other cases, the latter method is adopted. In Staffordshire, it is usual to sink a pair of pits' ; the establishment of works for a single colliery being called " a plant," or plantation.

That most important particular in the economy of our mines, and upon which the health and lives of the colliers so much depend — namely, VentQation — has been the theme of a great deal of discussion — not always temperately conducted. The philanthro- pist has sometimes upbraided the coal-viewer with murder, for neglecting the trial of some theory of injecting or circulating air; while the viewer, in turn, has occasionally scouted, with perhaps too litde ceremony, schemes which appeared ingenious and plausible enough on paper, but which might be to him obviously unavailable in practice. It will at once jbe apparent, that the mere existence of two or more pits at any given distance from each other, would do little, if any thing, toward cooling the interior of the mine, and changing the respirable air : the pits would simply stand, fiill of air, as in two vessels, under similar circumstances, water would stand at one level. Air must, therefore, be either artificially forced down one of the vents, or it must be made to descend by altering the quality of the subincumbent portion: both these methods have been resorted to- the latter with most success. As the natural ten*, dency of the atmosphere to restore its equilibrium, causes the general volume to travel by the nearest direct channel toward any place where a partial vacuum is formed j and as the object of the miner is to counteract, or rather to take advantage of, this law, stoppages are so arranged in the workings, by

Draining The Mine. 193

frap-doors* or other means, that the current brought down the working pit, instead of being allowed to tush to the air-pit directly, is first made to circulate as deviously and extensively as possible. We shall have occasion to advert to this arrangement again, and more particularly The draught is created, or a sort of vacuum formed in the air-pit, sometimes sim- ply by the suspension of a paa of burning coals, but more perfectly by closing the pit overhead, with the exception of a chimney, and keejnng up a fire therein, either near the top or at the bottom, as most conve- nient: thus by rarifying the air at this extremity, that tK)rtion of it which has been rendered foul by breath- ing rushes to the heat, while, to supply its place, a new and unvitiated volume is forced down the open pit.

The next object of attention, and one equally im- portant with ventilation, is the Draining of the Works. In almost every colliery there is more or less water — in most so much, that the pumping of it out of the workings is an affair of considerable importance; and sometimes it is necessary to erect the steam-engine, and work it for this purpose, during the sinking — the pumps being suspended and lengthened as the shaft increases in depth. It must at once occur to the reader, that, as the strata of every coal field have a certain incliBation with respect to the horizon, called the dip doiA rise J as well as commonly a level line of bearing, forming right angles therewith (to say nothing of

The boys who attend to open nd shnt these doon, are called trappen: thej hare oeate new the doors, and remain by them all the time the pit is at work. As these trap-doors are, as it were, the air-Tslves, by means of which the TentilatioB of the works, in connection with ondergroond passages, is kept np, a proper attention to them is a matter of great importance. They awy however, on account of the simplicity of the duty to be performed, com- monly entrusted to young boy on thoir first entrance upon work.

O

Level

194 Working Machinery.

&e many other complex modifications occurring' in practice) j and, as the drainage will generally follow the descent of the measures, it will be necessary to select such a situation for the engine-pit, that, as the excavations in getting the coal are extended, the water, instead of accumulating in the works, may run oflF to the place of the pumps. With this design it is usual to nk the engine-pit at the lower part of the field, the drawing shaft being at a short distance above on the rise of the strata. The annexed dia- gram' will sufficiently explain the arrangement

]rig. 33. Suppose the cross lines

to indicate a tract con- taining coal measures,

and dip towards the

[ east, the cross bearing

of the strata having a slight inclination firom north to south. The course of winning would be — Shaving sunk the engine-pit at A, nearest the lowest angle of the ground, and the working-pit at B, a little higher up, and having opened a passage between them, the next operation would be, to cut a drift or water-course along the lowermost level of the tract fix>m a to that when what is adled the winning headway, or main tho- roughfare, is excavated fi*om a to c, and the engine and drawing apparatus got to work, the coal is said to be won. The water firom the workings which are carried on the rise, mostly flowing off by means of cross galleries to the sump, or well in which the pumps work ; some portion also, it notay be, running down the headway a c.

Prior to Mr. Newcomen's application of steam

BUCKET WHEELS. Id5

to raising water from coal mines, both the water and coal were usually raised by means of engines wrought by horses, a method still in use among some land-sale collieries. About two centuries ago, a patent wa granted by James VI. of Scotland, for the discovery of an engine for raising water from coal mines. In 1630, a charter was also given to a person called David Ramsay for a similar invention.f Sometime after '' Master Beaumont, a gentleman from the south, brought with him rare engines to draw water out of the pits,''| at Newcastle. At the Lumley collieries, about 1676, '' the engines were placed in the lowest places, that there may be the less way for the water to rise ; and if there be a running stream to work the engines it is happy. Chain pumps are the best engines, for they draw constant and even : but they can have but two stories of them ; the second being with an axle- tree of seven or eight fathoms, and the deepest story is wrought by buckets, and a wheel and ropes with the force at the top.''§ These contrivances were, on the whole, clumsy, dangerous, expensive, and in- efficient. Mr. Bald, in his view of the coal trade of Scotland, printed in 1812, informs us that about 1690, water wheels and chains of buckets were com- monly employed to drain collieries in that country. The axle of the wheel extended across the pit moudi, and small wheels were fixed upon the axle to receive endless chains of two or three tiers — which reached down to the coal. To these chains were attached a number of oblong wooden buckets or troughs in a horizontal position, which circulated continually with the chains ascending on one side and descending on

Am. Hist of Edinb. 66. f Rymer Food. 1. xiz. t 189.

; Qrtfn Chorographia, 26. § North'i Life of Guildford, p. 137.

196 Working Machinery.

the other, filling at the bottom, coming up full, and dischaiing at the top, as the j turned over the wheels on the great axletree, and then descending empty to be filled again. Such a contrivance was very im- perfect : not only was there required a considerable head of water to turn the large wheel ; but of that which was taken up b j the buckets no small portion of it was spilled before it reached the top : besides, the machine was very expensive, costing, for a pit of eighty yards, not less than £160 : there were like- wise constant repairs — for, when a joint-pin gave way, &e whole set of chains and buckets fell to the bottom with a most tremendous crash, and eveiy bucket was splintered to pieces.

Where water could not be procured to work these machines, the same sort of machinery, only on a smaller scale, was adopted to be moved by horses. These were comparatively very expensive, and could only draw water finom a small depth ; so that those deeper fields of coal, where neither a day level nor water machinery could be employed, remained use- less— and that to all appearance, for ever, as there was no other device for getting clear of the water.

From the same authority we learn, that in the year 1708, wind mills were erected to work pumps in several collieries in Scotland; but these, although efficient machines at times, were very irregular ; and in cahn weather the mines were dxovmed and the workmen thrown idle.

In the year 1 709, John Earl of Mar, who paid the most minute attention to the improvement of his col- lieries in Clackmannanshire, sent the manager of his works to Newcastle to inspect the machinery of that district, and leam the mode of conducting colliery

s

Steam Engine. 107

operations in every department. From his report it appears, that tiie machines then in use were water wheels and horse engines, with chain pumps ; the common depth of the pits was from twenty to thirty fiithoms, and a few from fifty to sixty fathoms ; the expense of sinking one of these was about £66 ; and the machine for drawing the coals cost only £28. It appears that when it was requisite to draw water from the depth of thirty fathoms, two pits were sunk at a little distance fr9m each other; one pit was made thirty fiithoms deep, the other only half that depth. One machine drew the water half way up the deep pit, and then it was poured into a mine, which com- municated with the bottom of the other pit : from this the water was raised to the surface by another machine. In deeper mines, a third pit, wiih a third machine, was resorted to. But in Scotland, at the same time, the machinery was more powerful; as water was raised at once from the depth of forty fathoms, by the chain of buckets before described.

Though it is generally admitted that the Marquis of Worcester has referred to some kind of a steam- engine, in his Century of Inventions,'' so early as 1656, there was no practical application of any such machinery, so far as is known, until more tium half a century afterwards. One of the earliest recorded experiments haviuff been made at the colliery of

to have maintained a great number of horses, at a vast expense. Mr. Hodgson states, that the first seen in the county of Northumberland, f was erected at Byker,

Bald, as quoted in Parey'B Treatiie on tbe Steam Engine, p. 237.

f To an indiTidoal in that ooanty is attributed a contrivance, fbe origin of wbich has often been alluded to in Tarions ways — in 17 IS, Mr. Beighton, of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, remoTed the flimsy strings and catches with which

198 Working Machinery.

in 1714, by the son of a Swedish Nobleman, who taught mathematics in Newcastle. "This powerful engine is now in contunon use in all the large col- lieries. As simplifiers of it, the names of Messrs. Boulton and Watt, as well as that of the ingenious builder of the Eddjstone light-house, will be loi remembered/' When the last-named party, under the sanction of their patent, introduced the improved steam engines into the mining districts, they stipu- lated, after receiving a laige price for the engines put down, to divide with the parties working diem, the amounts accruing from the saving of friel effected, as compared with the old machines ; and so profitable was this arrangement, especially in Cornwall, where coal was dear, that one concern (the Consolidated Mines Company), using three powerful engines, paid to the patentees £2,400 per annum.

The pumps, of which there may be one or more in each pit according to circumstances, are of a size proportionate to the work to be done : sometibmes they are 12, 18, and even as much as 24 inches in diame- ter. If there be two or three pumps or cylinders, as is sometimes the case, they are placed side by side, and supported at intervals by beams fixed across the pit ; cisterns being placed at different elevations to which the water is raised, and if possible delivered off by an adit considerably below the surface : in some instances also, cisterns are placed at the level of feeders of water that occur at a distance of many fathoms from the bottom, and deliver some hundreds of gallons per minute, so as to save the waste of steam power which would be consequent on allowing this

the lelf-acting engine had, till that time, been incnmbered, and applied leter-rods for opening and ahiiUing the cocks, which seemed to perfect the machine.

Underground Steam-Em>Ines. 190

water to ftiU to the sump, in order to raise it througli the whole length of the pumps. The hydraulic ac- tion is exactly similar to that of a common sucking pump. Hie bucket in each cylinder consists of a stout rim of iron, surrounded with thick leather, and having a cross bar, to which are hinged two valves or clacks opening upwards : there is also a fdmilar contrivance made stationary near the bottom of the pump. The rods or spears to which the working buckets are attached, are fastened with cottars on each side of a piece of wood, which is suspended by chains on the head of the engine beam, which projects through an opening in the engine-house, and over the pit : it has a lug or bracket on each side, and which fall upon pieces of timber, and thus pre. Tent the rods from sinking too low. To the upper part of its face the rods, as already stated, are sus* pended by a stout chain, exactly resembling in con* strudion that inside a watch -: occasionally, the more scientific contrivance for affecting the parallel motion, by means of iron rods, is adopted. In order to avoid the inconvenience resulting from the immense weight of the pump rods in very deep mines, as well as to serve other purposes, there have been instances of the erection of steam-engines 100 fathoms below the surface. Mr. Farey mentions an instance of an en- gine working underground in a colliery at White- haven in 1776. It was placed 80 fathoms beneath the sur&ce, and worked a series of pumps disposed down the dip or inclination of the strata of coai, which was very rapid. The pumps lifted four fathoms each, from one to another, and were worked by one sliding rod from the engine. The intention of this disposition was to avoid piercing the floor, which

200 Working Uachinery.

must have been done with a perpendicnlar pit and thus have let much water u]>on the workings. The same authority adds : — In many situations where the bed of coal dips suddenly and if the strata be- neath the coals be of a porous nature, it is of great importance to preserve the water-tight floor of the coal perfect, in order to prevent the passage of the water ;, and in all such cases the pumps must be placed on the slope of the strata, instead of in perpendicular pits/' In the Alfred pit at Jarrow, there is a 30- horse steam-engine erected at a depth of about 130 fathoms below the surface: it is used in raising the coals up a shaft which unites with the workings, car- ried out 45 £3ith(ns deeper still : there is likewise at the profound depth indicated by these two shafts, another steam-engine, to draw the coals up an in- clined plane that lies coincident with the dip of the strata.

We may now proceed to describe the arrange- ments adopted for raising the cool. The erection of head-gear will depend much, not only upon the de- scription of machinery to be employed, but also upon the number and shape of the corves intended to be used. In some of the Staffordshire collieries, two pits are sometimes sunk sufficiently near each other to be worked by the same gin or whimsey, one of the buckets or corves ascending, while the other is de- scending in a separate shaft. In certain situations of this sort, the erection over the pit-mouth is ex ceedingly simple and inexpenriye, consifting some- times of nothing more than an inclined piece of tim* ber with a pulley at the end for the rope to pass over, and supported by wooden props, as represented in

TreatiBe on Steam-Engine, p. 230.

Bead Oeah. 301

tlte accompong sketch (Jig. 33). a is the profile Pigsa. of the parallel beams

which support the head

wheel. B the banksman, whose busmess it is to lay hold upon the corve on its ascending above the [at-moath, by means of his hook ; and having released it Irom the chain, to hurry it away, c the corfe, made of ribs of iron, and filled with bard coal. E E the rope which passes between the se- cond pit and the whimsey (see Jig. 24).

The more commoD structure, however, is si- milar in general arrange- ment to die delineation on next page (fig. 24). Two cast-iron wheels, 4 feet diameter, either with grooved edges for round ropes, or with cylindrical surfaces for flat ropes, are elevated beside one another in the upper part of a fiiamework of timber over the mouth of the pit : the whole is rendered very substantial by buttresses applied on every side. In some collieries chains are used ; they are reckoned more economical than ropes, but the links are more liable to raap without giving warning by appearances of wearing or otherwise, than is generally the case with ropes. A flat rope, con-

303 Working Machinery.

usting of four round ones sewed together, and in- vented hy tbe late John Curr, Esq. of Belle Vue, Fig. SI.

near Sheffield, is in general use. The ropes or cludns pass irom the head wheels to the drum of the gin, or to a wooden cylinder, on the axle of a wheel worked bj an adjacent steam-engine, upon which thej are wound. The annexed cut represents the exterior appearance of one of the old-fashioned steam-engines, still very common about collieries, and caUedawhim,

F18.3A.

Counter-Weight. 203

or whimsej (fig 25). A the enginebeam. b the boiler, c the working cylinder. D the fly-wheel. F the cog-wheel, carrying the drum upon which the rope is wound, e e the ropes, passing to the head- gear {see Jig. 23). In the forking of this machi- nery, the engine-tenter stands with his hand upon a lever, to stop the steam, and stay the action of the whole, the moment he sees the corfe aboveground.

In some collieries, the engines of Boulton and Watt, or others of an expensive description, are erected, as well for drawing out the coals, as for pumping up the water. In drawing the loaded corves up the deep shafts on the Tyne and Wear, it is commonly found necessary to aid the power of the steam-engine in the earlier stage of its operation, by means of an ingenious contrivance called a counter- fDcighU The plan is this : a few yards from the drawing machinery, a pit is sunk for the reception of a ponderous chain, which, passing over a pulley ele vated on posts, is attached to the shaft of the drum upon which the main rope winds. When the power of the engine begins to be exerted in raising the corv es from the bottom of the pit, this chain, many of the terminal links of which wdgh 100 lbs., likewise ex- erts a degree of aid proportionate to its weight. As, however, the engine acquires energy by the elevation of the loaded, and the descent of the empty corves, the ponderous links of the chain fall upon each other at the bottom of the counterpoise pit, until the engine, having raised its load to a position which leaves sur- plus power, the chain, being reversed on its drum, begins to be wound up ; thus countervailing the ve- locity of the machinery at its maximum, as it had previously aided it at its stage of least efficiency.

204 Working Machinery.

The annesed slight profile sketch of the works at Canille od the Tyne, in the Wallsend group of col- Ueries, will give some idea of the arrangements above

described (fig. 26). A the tall brick funnel adjacent to the upcast shaft i):the smoke disperser. c a platform for convenience of cleansing, repairs, &c. D head-gear {fig. 24.) orer the drawing pit, sup- porting the wheels over which the ropes pass. ' e engine-house, containing the fly-wheel> winding cy- linders, and oth machinery. F counterpoise.

It should be mentioned fliat previously to the ap- plication of steam, by what was at first tcnned the " fire . engine," a great variety of expedients for drawing coals were devised. " The most andent machine in my knowledge, now [1797] in use," says Mj. Curr, is that invented by Menzey ; but there are few situations that afford the requisites necessary to that invention. A stream of water, with a &U of about half the depth of the pit is necessary, if any business of consequence must be done. Its con- struction consists of two rope wheels fixed upon one horizontal axis, which are so proportioded to the

Water Engines. 205

depths of the water pit and coal pit, as to reach the separate depths of the pits, b j the same revolutions ; and the power applied is a tub of water large enough to overbalance the weight to be drawn. The second is the conunon machine, greatly in use in the neigh- bourhood of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, the construction of which is, a water wheel and a rope wheel upon one horizontal axis; and the power is a stream of water, sufficient to overbalance the weight to be drawn. The method of obtaining this stream of water in the neighbourhood of Newcastle and Sunderland, where there are, I presume, no less than 30 or 40 in number, is a fire-engine placed by the side of the machine, which raises the water alternately to the top of the wheel ; but in two collieries where I have adcted them, the scheme is more advantageous than those at Newcastle, being able to do without a fire- engine erected solely ibr that purpose ; in the winter season when water is plentiful, and the engines are generally sufficiently employed with draining the collieries, we have the aid of adjoining brooks, which do our business; and in the summer season, our engines are so constructed, as to apply a part of their power to raise the water to the top of the wheel/' So rapid have been the steps by which the steam engmahas been advaacedZm L primitive model, to its present degree of perfection, that one finds some difficulty in conceiving of its employment, no longer than from thirty to forty years since, being merely that of pumping water upon a wheel in the absence of natural brooks !

We noticed, not long since, a contrivance for raising coak on a principle sinular to the foregoing,

Coal Viewer and Engine Builder's Practical Coitopanion, p. 34.

200 Working Macuincry.

at a coal-work in Derbyshire. The vicinity of a pit newly sunk for working, happening to include an cd shaft heavily watered from near the top, an axle with drums was placed across : to one of these was sus- pended by a rope, a laie tub, and from the other a rope was carried over the head wheels at the adjacent pit — the tub being at the top of one pit whilst the corfe was at the bottom of the other, — and vice versa. The tub thus suspended near the spring, was made to stand constantly full of water — on the ringing of a bell from the pit, the common intimation that the corfe must be drawn up, a catch is let go by the banksman, who pressing upon a brake to regulate the velocity of tlie machinery, suffers the tub to descend to the bottom, when a valve is opened and the water flows out, the corfe at the same moment being ready for landing at the other pit's mouth. An empty corfe being hung on, is Just so much heavier than the empty tub, that the former descends while the latter is brought up and secured in the situation first described. This plan, which however can rarely be adopted, is free from many of those chances of accident ta which other methods of drawing are liable, where the machinery, if not stopped exactly at the moment the corfe rises above the surfSue, and the reverse motion to lower it for removal accurately performed, will carry it over the head-wheels, and produce, as sometimes happens, fiital consequences. In Brinsley collieiy, Notts., large buckets of water descending upon wheels along an inclined plane were at one time used to draw coals.

To facilitate the landing of the corfe or waggon, a strong wooden platform or trap-door is constructed, so as to admit of being brought over the pit moiith.

Landing Platform. 207

and locking with an iron bar, by the mere lifting of a lever, the instant that the ascending corfe has cleared its level, inunediately after which, by a reverse motion of the machinery the corfe is dropped upon the platform, detached from the hook, and drawn away to bank, or to the tram road. About New- castle, two, and in some cases three, of the basket corves are drawn to bank at a time : they are sus- pended at short distances from each other on the rope, so that they occupy no more room in their progress up and down the shaft, than would be occupied by single corves. In some pits attempts are making to substitute large iron tubs for these baskets in raising the coals ; at BraddyVs colliery of South Hetton, tubs, containing 24 cwt. each, are used. The term corfe, is commonly applied to any shallow box, or like con- trivance, used for bringing stuff up out of mines :, in the northern collieries, where the coals are tender and oft;en broken, they use a basket-corfe of a globular shape, and formed of twigs : it has a stout bent iron bow, to which the rope is attached, and is generally moved about on a small, low, four wheeled vehicle called a tram. In Staffordshire, and some other places, the coals are drawn out of the pit in

The deiiyadozi is obvioiialy from tke Diitoh Karf, a basket; that used in our collieries being made of hazle rods, somewhat in the manner of a hamper ; the oorf-bow was formerly for the most part of young seasoned saplings of oaky ash, or alder, of the thickness of three inches sad aboat two yards long : it is now more commonly of iron. Oreat care is taken to keep up the corfe to its proper size ; for it is liable to be beaten down daily against the sides of the pit, and in time, to lose nearly one-third of its origins] measure. It is the banksman's office to take care that the eonres be properly filled : if any fraud be discovered, they are set aside, and the hewer is not paid for them. The correr, or maker of them, is paid in the following singular way: he is allowed a certain sum (formerly 4jd) for every score of eonres that are brought up the shaft, for which he is bound to £nd the pit with as many corves as are wanted, and also to keep them up to their exact measu, and in good repair.

208 Working Machinery.

buckets attached to sledge bottoms, similar to those of the tubs used in sinking ; they are mostly made of sheet iron for the small, and of flat ribs rivetted at a distance from each other for the large coal. In the Yorkshire collieries, small waggons, made either of wood or of wrought iron, and generally in the shape of the large Newcastle waggons, are very generally used, as well in the uaderground operations, as in raising the coals from the pit, and also for drawing them to the carts, canal, or any adjacent station to which light cast-iron rails can be conveniently laid.

A shaft, up which coals are to be drawn, especially when sunk to a great depth, and of considerable width, is commonly not only walled and bratticed with boards, as already described, but when intended for the working of square corves or waggons, it is frimished with what are called conductors, an admi- rable arrangement, which, along with the appreciate corfe, was invented by the late Mr. Curr, and gene- rally adopted in the extensive collieries about Leeds, Barnsley, and Sheffield. These conductors,'' in the words of the patentee, are nothing more than two or three upright rods of deal 4 inches by 3, bragged iq)on opposite sides of the pit, forming mor- tices or channels, by which the corves are conducted, being suspended upon cross-bars wiUi rollers at their ends, which run within the mortices." In some places, these conductors consist of iron rods, bolted to massive beams at the pit bottom, and connected above to the head-gear by strong screws, which keep them tight and in their vertical position. In the use of single buckets, or even when drawing with the large bulging wicker-work corves, there is no occasion for guides of this sort, as, however the corves them-

Screening Apparatus. 209

selves may happen to turn about, their relation to the sides of the shaft and to each other remains unaltered. On the other hand, waggons in transitu, would, on account of their form, and the smallness of the space through which they pass, be liable to frequent and dangerous collision; but when placed in b, sort of iron fiame or chair, on the outside of which are friction wheels in contact with the wooden conductors, or sliding rings upon the iron ones, a steady uniform motion is given to the waggon and its crib, even when moving at the rate of one hundred and forty yards in half a minute: on the whole load being drawn up, and lowered upon the platform as above mentioned, the wheels of the vehicle first coming in contact with the board, it stands loose, and ready to be drawn away, and to be replaced by an empty one, an operation performed with surprising celerity. Connected with every pit in the neighbourhood of Newcastle there is a contrivance for screening the coals : in most cases it consists of a platform sloping at an angle of about 45 deg. from the raised bank about the pit toward the ground : at intervals are inserted grates twelve or fifteen feet in length, and about four feet wide, having the spaces between the bars more or less considerable according to the size of coal required to pass through. On each side of these grates, boards are placed to confine the coals in their course, and they are likewise boarded under- neath, in such a manner as form the surface of spouts, by means of which the dust and small coal which pass through the bars fall into waggons placed for that purpose, as other waggons are placed outside of them for the reception of the screened coal. In general, however, since the repeal of the duty has

p

210 Working Machinery.

left it at the option of the coal dealer whether he will send large or small coal to market, or both together, the screens are mostly used merely to take the dust out of the coal*

In some situations, access to the coal workings is obtained, and the produce drawn out, by means either of a subterranean side cut from some navigable canal, or by a long tunnel laid with tram rails, and inclined more or less according to the elevation of the mea- sures, and the relative situation of the sides of the valley or foot of the hiU through which the perfora- tion has to be carried. This description of entrance is called a fuUeril — footrail ? There is probably no instance of its occurrence at the deep mines about Newcastle, though there are many in Yorkshire and pther parts of the kingdom. Such road affords a convenient way for visiting the subtranean workings to those timid persons who might hesitate to descend the shaft by means of a corfe. Where there exists the convenience of <utting to the coal a galleiy which shall incline from the workings to the day, if the distance be not considerable and the line dhrect, the laying down of double courses of flanch rails, enables the colliers to send out the full waggons so as to bring back again those that have been emptied, by connecting each set with a chain passing over a horizontal wheel at tiie head of the rail road. If on the other hand, the road inclines towards the coal, horses must be employed to bring out the waggons. A small canal, must, of course, be altogether on the dead level : in this case, the coals are either filled into long narrow barges at the water's head, or the corves are placed on a floating platform.

Chapter Xi.

Underground Works And Venti-

Lation.

Methods of Carrying out the Underground Excavar- tions of a CoBiery — Broad and Long Work — Roads, BenkSj and Gates — Plan of a Staffordshire CoBiery — Ventilation — Theory of the Circulation of Atmospheric Air — Downcast and Upcast Shafts — Furnace — Simple and Compound Ventilation — Other contrivances — Description of Felling Colliery, Durham — Extensive and orderly arrangements-- Fire Damp and Choke Damp— Scheme of Venti- lotion proposed by Mr. Menzies — Blowers or jets of Inflammable Gas — How got rid of.

JlIAVING described the method of sinking a shafts and of putting down pumps, with the requisite working machinery bj means of which the gaining, or as the parties concerned term it, winning, the coal is effected, it is proper in the next place to give some account of the underground operations. In getting the cool, the colliers do not, on coming at the seams, begin to hack and hew down at random as large a quantity as possible of the stratum within their reach ;

p2

212 Underground Works And Ventilation.

such a mode, although adopted to some extent in ob- taining the Bovey coal, which lies comparatively near the surface, and commonly also in getting iron ore, would be utterly inadequate and ruinous if applied to the working of the deep seams of coal generally.

As the great object is to combine economy in ex- tracting the greatest quantity of coal, with securing the personal safety of the pitmen — the latter, alas ! not always possible — plans are laid down for under- ground operations, with as much accuracy as the inchnography of a complicated building or a city about to be erected on terra firma ; and these plans are practically carried out in the workings to an extent* and with a degree of precision, the result of that perfect adaptation of the means to the end, which long practice and incessant attention have introduced into our collieries. There are two methods of car- rying out the excavations in getting the coal — the [kmff or broad, and the short or narrow methods ; the foimer, by means of which nearly all the coal in- tended to be got is dug out at once, as is commonly the case in Yorkshire and elsewhere, where the strata immediatelv above and below the coal are hard and firm ; the latter method is general on the banks of tlie Tvne and Wear, in which districts the coal itself is not only much moro tender, but the over and un- derlying matters less to be trusted to, so that large portions of the seam are required to be left to support the roof.

The following underground plan, (in which of course there is no regard paid to exact proportion)

The spce trarersed by some of the works in NorUmmberland, Dnrham, and Cumberland, is amasingiT great The HowgiU Colliery at Wbitebjftven, tbe property of the Earl of Ionsdale, extended over an area of 2300 exceeding, in thk mpect, any other in the kingdom.

Plan Of A Coal Work.

will illustrate one of the most ordinary modes of working in the Yorkshire collieries ; —

Suppose the laier circle to represent the working shaft, sunk to the coal on its lower edge or dip to- wards the west ; a commodious galleiy ia excavated upon the level bearii of the strata, and stretching in opposite directions from the bottom of the pit for the general conveyance of all matters to be drawn out ; it is usually laid with cast-iron tram rails, along which the waggons or corves are drawn mostly by ponies; hence it is called "tlie. horse gate* or way. Parallel with this, another working ia carried, upon which is sunk the engine pit, connected with the working shaft, and consequently with the horse gate and boards by a drift, and which being intended to serve as the common drain of the mine, in called the water gate. At right angles with these lines, and branching from the horse gate, first at the pit bottom,

In Yorkihire tbc lerm " gle" is commnnly used fur a road or wiy.

214 Underground Works And Ventilation.

and then at dbtances of 70 or 80 yards, other work- ings denominated boards or board gates are carried out. The areas of coal included within the open courses already indicated, are called benks, perhaps originally banks, and their contents are removed in the following manner : — The colliers proceed to drive a heading, or counter level, as they call it, at a short distance from the bottom of the working shaft, through the coal on either side of the main board or mother gate, and in a line parallel to the horse gate, and only at such a distance from it as to leave a satisfactory wall of coal between the two. This ex- cavation having been carried, say 80 yards towards the north, the men then begin to work towards the east upon the face of coal presented on the rise side of this excavation. So soon as a few yards of coal have been cleared out, double rows of stout wooden puncheons or props are placed to support the roof* : the miners then proceed to get out another portion of the seam, until it becomes again necessary

The appeUaUons roof tandi floor, ore glyen to those faces of the gallery or benk which are respectively over the head and imder the feet of the pit- maiiy while the sides aie termed walls. The walls are generally nothing more than Uiose vertical sorfaiceB of coal which are left on either hand of the workmen, wliile the reof and floor are more frequently of stone, shale, earth, or other matter bomiding the coal strata horizontally. Sometimes the loof appears to hang down for a short distance helow its ordinary level, pressing the coal, and as it were squesKing it much thinner, especially in the middle of the spaoe. These acddenU of the roof pressing down neaier the pave- ment than it ahonld be, and apparently squeesing the coal below its oidinaiy thickness, are of varioos dimensions. The lesser ones are like a wart or small protaberanoe on the under side of the stratum, which is the immediate roof ot the coal ; and this protnberanee sinks down into the upper side of the seam of coal like the bottom of a great pot: it is called by the Scotch col- Hers a botmet case. Bat these hemispherical depressions are not always of such small dimensions: some of them instead of being two or three feet, aro as many yards; and occasionally they squeeze out ono-third, at other times

one-half of the thickness of the coal, thus forming in it, a basin shaped caTity.

Benk8 And Passages. 315

to support the roof of the woikmg : die puncheons are, tberore, withdrawn, and replaced in advance of their former position — the roof of that part of tlie benk whence they are removed being allowed to fall down wholly or in part according to the quality of the rock composdng it One or two props, however, are left standing on the side next the board gate, and these in time form a passage called the baxtow gate, by means of which the produce of the benk is discharged by the slit through the wall of coal into the board gate. When the working by these means has proceeded so far as to rendar it (the length of this barrow gate) inconvenient, a fresh dit is cut through the coal into the board gate.

These benks are usually worked in pairs ; first, on each aide of the mother gate to a distance of eighty yards: and thi from parallel board gates opening into the general horse gate. Between the benks are likewise carried openings called wind gates, con- nected with an air or furnace pit in some part of the workings, to effect the ventilation of the mines. In first carrying out the excavations, prudence requires that the walls of coal indicated on the plan should be of considerable substance : but after the limit of the colliery has been reached, and on the abandonment of the works being resolved upon, those walls which were necessarily left to support the immense pressure from above, are oft;en reduced at the last to a much greater degree of thinness, or even partially removed, so far as may be considered consistent with the safe retreat of the miners ; there is generally, however, a

These wooden pUlan, which have usnolly between their heads and the roof of the mine a slab of board called a templet, are commonly of Scotch fir or larch of about 25 years' growth, or oak weedings of six or seyen inches diameter.

316 UNDERGROUND ffORKS AND VENTILATION.

deal of coal left in one way or other, often about oue- eighth of the original mass, occauoually so little as one-tenth ; but all this depends upon such a variety of circumstances, that no positive proportion can be mentioned as true of a variety of localities.

In some of the Staffordshire collieries, where the coal is of such an amazing thickness, immense sec- tions are excavated with a comparative impunity of danger ; pillars of coal beiug left at intervals to sup- port the roof, which from its height, and the vastness of the workings carried on beneath it, presents, when lighted up, a most impressive spectacle. The fol- lowing is a ground plan of the old Bradley mine, F,g, 27. nearBilston. There

are two shafts ad- jacent to each other A A. The horse gate is indicated by B B, and the nar- rower gallerj', com- mencing at one of the pita and termi- nating in the open workings at c, is the air way. The stronger dark por- tion of the engraving is the rib, surrounding the work ; D is a bolt hole or passage through the rib ; and E E E are bolt holes stopped to cause a circula- tion of air through the work, f is a mass of coal left to support the shaft. The masses severally marked o, are the pillars which support the roof: the two smaller ones H H, are called by the miners " man of war" i)illar8. The excavated spaces in the direction

Theory Of Ventilation. 217

of the darts are merely called openings : those in the cross direction, stalls.

In the method of proceeding by narron> or long work, as practised about Newcastle, the excarations, as already intimated, are conducted on a much more complicated plan than those just described. To give some idea of the mode, it may be stated that long passages are cut through the coal, generally in a straight line : these openings are crossed by others at right angles, and 4 or 5 yards wide, the solid in- tervening masses forming rectangular pillars of coal 20 yards by 0, or, in some instances, square cubes of about the latter measurement on each side. It is in collieries of amazing depth, and containing many miles of excavation thus arranged, that perfect venti- lation becomes an affair of equal difficulty and im- portance.

The efficiency of any system of ventilation con- ducted upon the ordinary principles, must depend mainly upon an attention to three particulars : — 1, upon the opening of proper apertures for the admis- sion of the atmospherical current ; 2, on some me- thod of accelerating, and by this means renewing, the volume of air in progress through the mine ; and 3, in such a construction of the undeiground works, that every part shall be exposed to the ventilation. To illustrate this description — suppose the annexed Fig. 28. diagram (Jiff. 28.) to represent a

tube, having each end bent upwards

at right angles with the horizontal

portion, so as to form one level and

the tube will be filled with air throughout, just as it might be filled with water,

B

218 Underground Works And Ventilation.

which would stand at the same height in each limb ; of course there will be no circulation; so that should anj circumstance occur to deteriorate the air in any part, especially in the horizontal portion, it would mdn eitber stagnant near the spot wher k was generated, or merely difiuse itself through the adjacent mass. And although the cause of deterio- ration might be of such a nature, that, by rarifying the internal volume in its vicinity, there would be a slight descent of fresh air, stiU, as the atmosphere would continue to press equally upon both apertures, nothing like circulation would take place, while the impure mass might be increased and concentrated. But if to the tube a we apply the flame of a lamp, or in any other way raise the temperature withinside, a new state of things instantly commences : a current of fresh air will rush down the tube B, and passing along the horizontal part c, will re-issue at a, thus ventilating, or, as it were, sweepii] the entire pas- sage : and this operation will go on so long as heat is applied at a. This is, in fact, nearly the entire theoiy of simple ventilation ; B representing . the downoisl pit or shaft, by which the air descends into c, or working drift ; after sweeping which, it rises to mix with the atmosphere, by the tfcast shaft a. And

In |iGtice, however, the result is eomewhat different, owing to the temperatare ot one part of the mine being raised oondderably higher than the other, owing to the presence of the workmen and other causes. The instant a dip-pit is connected with a rise-pit, by adrift, a strong circulation of air like wind commenoes. If the air at the surface is at the freezing point, it descends the dip or deepest pit, freezes all the water upon the sides of the pit, and even forma icicles upon the roof of the coal; bat the same air, in iu passage along the boardways to the rise-pit, which is generally of less depth, has its temperatare greatly increased, and issues from the pit mouth in the form of a dense misty cloud, formed by the condensation of the natural vapour of the mine in the freezing atmosphere. Mr. Bald, in Edin. Phil. Joum. vol. I. 134, where a series of investigations on the temperature of air and water in coal mines may be found.

Simple Ventilation. 210

if a oery consisted simply, as is here supposed, of a aingle passage, however long or tortaons that pas- sage might be, between one pit and another, no mode of ventilation could be better than this.

In practice, the following is the method of venti- lation ordinarily adopted : — a (fig. 29.) is tiie down-

Fig.!.

cast shaft, and b the upcast at a short distance &om the bottom of the latter, and in the connecting passage c, is placed a iumace d, conusliiig of a platform of iron bars, raised somewhat from the ground, and covered with a fire of 7 or 8 feet in width, by 12 feet in length. The smoke and draught of this fire, in- stead of being connected with the bottom of the pit B, are provided for by the carrying of an arched drift E, in an inclined direction, from above the fire-place into the shaft, at a little distance from the bottom.* A sbing of boards is placed at f, to prevent access of the air in that direction. In what is called com- pound ventilation, a passage is carried from o, where there is also a fiiniace, to another downcast pit H, in ao opposite direction to the first. Wallsend, Percy Min, Hebbum, and Heaton coUieries, were all ven- tilated upon this principle.

In ordinuT casea, the tmoke Crom the imdergioiuid fnnuce, at otbar works, ia conducted bj a latural flue neir tbo top of the ghift into a capft- clous chimnpj {fjig. 26, p. ifrlj.

220 Underground Works And Ventilation.

So far the apparent object is merely the ventila- tion of a single passage, or open space, hetween the pita ; but as, by a law of pneumatics, the air has a tendency to rash from the downcast to the upcast ahaJl by the nearest openings, a large portion of every tract of workings carried forward by the narroK plan as above mentioned, would be unvisited by the fresh current, if it were not compelled by certain con- . trivances to traverse all the galleries. To shew how this ia effected, fiff. 30. represents a plan of a small ng.30.

Compound Ventilation. 221

worldiig ventilated by the compound method above alluded to, only that in this inatancei instead of two downcast pits and one upcast vre have the three formed by bratticing or boarding a single shaft into three divisions, a e i — the two former letters indica* ting the downcast, and the latter the upcast, sections of the pit : near to the bottom of the latter are the two furnaces. The darts shew the direction of the two currents of air from their respective downcast pits, to the bottom of the upcast pit. The single lines in the figure shew tlie headway brattices ; the double Unes, the stoppings ; mmmm, the winning head- ways, driven in the longitudinal direction of the coal, or in the line of its bearing ; n nnn, the stentings or opening between the double headways ; fv w;, the walls, or passages between the boards at the end of each pillar ; 5 6 5 6 6 6, the boards or passages dri- ven in the transverse direction of the coal, and at right angles out of the headways ; the boards are the places from which the daily supplies of coal are ob- tained. Just beyond the darts on each side of a: are the two furnaces ; k k k are three arches by which the current of air is carried over its former course.

In the old method of simple ventilation, the air, after descending the downcast pit, would, as before stated, pass in the shortest line to the upcast, but was prevented by doors and stoppings, and carried round by the extremities of the workings to the upcast shaft, without ever visiting the interior parts of the mine, in which, consequently, the air was left to stagnate. If, therefore, a discharge of inflammable gas happened to occur in the old workings, as it not uncommonly did, it soon difiused itself, and, along with the stagnant air, got into the course of the at-

222 Underground Works And Ventilation.

mospheric current rendering it nearly impossible for the workmen to prevent its exploding at tlieir lights as they pass and repass along the working headways.

The inadequacy of this system, according to the testimony of Mr. Buddie was fully admitted ; but no improvement was made, until the late ingenious Mr. Spedding, of Whitehaven, to whose memory our tribute of gratitude is due, suggested the idea of caursinff the air ; that is, forcing it through every passive of the several workings, or, in other words, making an air-pipe of every passage of the several workings of a coal mine : this sweeping of every part is effected by a complicated arrangement of stoppings and trap-doors ; and so long as these are kept in order, and the passages open, it is almost impossible for there to be any accumulations of inflammable gaa owing to stagnation of the air in any part of the workings.

Besides the method of rarifying a volume of air in the upcast shaft, so as to promote ventilation by means of a furnace placed near the bottom, or as is sometimes the case, on the top of the pit, various other contrivances have been adopted, such as rari- fying the air, by passing it through a large iron cylinder heated to a high temperature — the inflam- mable gases never igniting from contact with hot metal through which they may pass, though they would inevitably explode were they to come over an open fire. Exhausting and forcing pumps, worked by the engine, have sometimes been employed : 1Mb*. Buddie prefers the former, because by the exhausting

From whose interesting letter, addressed in 1813 to Sir R. MUbanke, Bart, on the Tarious idodes employed in the ventilation of collieries, these descriptions are derired.

Felling Colliery. 223

system the atmosphere always presses on the down- cast shaft; whereas by the contrary method, the current of air often recoils in pinched air courses. Emissions of steam and water have also been applied in ventilation — the former to aid the descent of cool air in the downcast shaft, and the latter to procure rarification in the upcast.

As ftirther illustrative of the general course of un- deiground working in the north, nmy be given the subjoined particulars relative to Felling Colliery, situate about a mile and a half east of Gateshead, in the county of Durham, and memorable as having been the scene, in 1812, of a most dreadftd explosion of fire damp," by which ninety-two human beings were suddenly hurried into eternity. The account is extracted from the Introduction to a Funeral Ser- mon preached on the occasion, and published by the Rev. John Hodgson, the intelligent historian of the county of Northumberland. The colliery alluded to is in the parish of Jarrow, celebrated as the birth- place of the Venerable Bede," and still exhibiting the ruins of the monastery founded by him. The locality contains, in common with the adjacent neigh- bourhood, several strata of coal, the uppermost of which were extensively wrought in the beginning of the last century. Ilie stratum called the High Main, noticed in a previous chapter, was won,'' or come at, in 1 779, and continued to be wrought till the 19th January, 1811, when it was entirely exca- vated. The present colliery is in the seam called the Low Main. It commenced in October, 1810, and was at full work in May, 1811. The working, or downcast shaft, called the John Pit, in accordance with the general custom of giving names to the

224 Underground Works And Ventilation.

shafts, is 204 yards deep, and furnished with a ma- chincy or steam engine, for drawing the coal, and with an engine called a tvfUm gin wrought by horses, and of use in letting down and drawing up the work- men when the machine chances to be crippled, or repairing; and when it lies idle on pay Saturdays and on Sundays.

The up-cast, or air furnace shaft, called the Wil- liam Pit, is on an eminence 550 yards south-west of the John Pit, and is distinguished by a wliim gin, and a lofty tube of brick work. This shaft is 232 yards deep. Over each pit two iron pullies, weighing 9 cwt. a piece, and over which the ropes passed, were suspended on a shaft-frame. The stoppings, which are commonly made of brick and lime, were in this colUery strengthened on each side with a of stone. The trap doors were made of stout wood; and each attended by a boy : they are seldom used but in the avenues leading from the working shaft to the workings.

In all large collieries, the air, as already intimated is accelerated through the workings, by placing a large fire, sometimes at the top and sometimes at the bottom of the upcast shaft ; in the latter case it is usually connected with the pit, serving as a chimiiey, by an arched gallery of brick, which in this colliery was about 50 feet in length, the furnace being six feet from the bottom of the shaft. The course of air, in the works at Felling, was merely up and down some of the principal boards in use, until it traversed the newly formed sheth, or set of workings ; and alter fanning them, found its way down a passage called, from it use, the crane board, after which it ascended into the furnace, and thence, charged with noxious vapours, into the open air.

Trap Doors And Stoppings. 225

It is assumed in the previous remarks, that the puiitj and wholesomeness of a coal mine has no re- ference to its depth, though this has been disputed, on the ground that the gas is more condensed, and, therefore, more esplosive in deep than in shallow mines. If, however, the air be conducted in sufficient quantity through all parts of a mine, as above described, and no falls of matter from the roof occur to prevent its visiting every quarter, the old excavations, which are called wastes will be as con- stantly ventilated by as pure air as the boards in which the men are at work— each part of the mine will be uniformly wholesome ; but when obstructions occur, and are not speedily removed j when the fire in the furnace shaft is neglected ; or when care has not been taken to place the stoppings and trap-doors in proper places, or the trap-doors are carelessly left open, or stoppings fall down, — in all these cases ac- cumulations ofre-c2am (ctHiieAstythe by the colliers), immediately commence in places deprived of the at- mospheric current, and continue to train their dread- ful artiUery, and grow strong in danger, till the wastemeny or ventilators of the mine, discover them, and wash them off, or they ignite at the workmens candles.* Blasts occurring in stagnations, as in the fece of one or two boards, though they generally scorch the persons in their way, seldom kill them ; but when the air has proceeded lazily for several days through a colliery , and an extensive magazine

To prBYent tlie Accumtdalion of the fire damp, it waft formerly a practiee With the wcttikmen to set to it by the flame of a candle; asisg the pre- caatioii of lying proetrate on the ground during fhe explosion; bat this dan* geroaa praotlGe has long been relinqoished, except in some collieries where the quantity is so inconsiderable as to render the lightijig it mere matter of aamsement*

Q

236 Underground Works And Ventilation.

of fire damp is ignited in the wastes, then the whole mine is instantly illuminated with the most brilliant lightning — the expanded fluid drives before it a roaring whirlwind of flaming air, which tears up every thing in its progress, scorching some of the miners to a cinder, burying others under enormous heaps of ruins shaken from the roof ; and, thundering to the shaft, wastes it volcanic fury in a discharge of thick clouds, of coal, dust, stones, timber, and not unfire- quenUy limbs of horses.

But this part, though apparently the most terrible, is not the most destructive effect of these subterrane- ous thunderings. All the stoppings and trap-doors of the mine being blown down by the violence of the concussion, and the atmospheric current being for a short time entirely excluded from the workings, those individuals that survive the discharge of the fire damp are often instantly suffocated by the afierdamfy which immediately fills up the vacuum caused by the explosion. This deleterious vapour is called chohe- damp, and surfeit by the colliers, and is the carbo- nic acid of chemists. While the mine is at work, it lies sluggishly upon its floor, and suffers the a,tmos<: pheric air, as a lighter fluid, to swim upon it : fire- damp, being the lightest of the three, floats upon the atmospheric air, and thereby occupies a space, ac- cording to its present quantity, nearest the roof of the mine. A detailed account of one of these dread- ful explosions, and of its fatal consequences, will oc- cur in a subsequent chapter. The description of Fel- ling Colliery is adopted here, not only as giving a very clear idea of (he general character of the under- ground arrangements of the coal mines of Northum- berland and Durham, but also, because it was con-

Felling Colliery. 227

sidered by the workmen a model of perfection in the purity of its air, and orderly arrangements. The coals from the sheths or working boards on each side of the William Pit were conveyed in strong wicker baskets or corves, to the crane on trams, a narrow frame-work of wood mounted on four low wheels : this work was done by barranmieHy and putters, some of whom are men, and manage a tram singly, by going behind it and pudung it forward; these are called hewing putters, or headsmen: the others are two to a tram, and are called headsmen Bnijbals, the former of whom pull before at a rope called a soam, and the latter push behind with their shoulders : boys about 15 or 16 years old are employed in this department of the colliery. Horses are likewise used in drawing the coals along those lines of the working, where there is sufficient room for them. The use of the crane, in one of the boards mentioned before, is to lift the loaden corves off the trams, upon waggons which differ little from the trams, except in their being larger and stronger. From the crane, about four waggons, each carrying two corves, and chained together, were taken to the crane board, by means of an inclined plane, on which the empty wag- gons were drawn up by the descent of the loaded ones, both sets being attached to a chain passing over a ho- rizontal wheel, connected by machinery with a brake, in the charge of a hrdkeman, and adapted to regulate the velocity of the waggons. From the bottom of the inclined plane, the coals were conveyed on the same wagons to the John Pit. This inclined plane was reckoned equal to saving the daily expense of at least 13 horses — the whole concern, at the period immedi- ately preceding the catastrophe afterwards mentioned,

q2

228 Underground Works And Ventilation.

wore the features of die greatest possible prosperity, and no accident, except a trifling explosion of fire- damp, slightly burning two or three workmen, had occurred. Two shiSy or sets of men, were con- stantly employed, except on Sundays. Twenty-five acres of coal had been excavated. The first shift en- tered the mine at four o'clock, a. m., and were re- lieved at their working posts by the next, at eleven o'clock in the morning. The establishment it em- ployed under ground, consisted of about 128 persons, who, in the fortnight, from the 11th, to the 25th of May, 1812, wrought 624 scores of coal, equal to 1,300 Newcastle chaldrons, or 2,45517 London chal- drons.

In the Annals of Philosophy for April 1816, there is an interesting communication on the ventilation of coal mines, by Lieut. Menzies, of Durham. The object of the writer is to recommend a method of working in which, the floor and roof of the mine shall be inclined, conformably to the dip of the strata which may range perhaps fi'om one in five to one in twenty; tibough about one in twelve, or nearly the mean of these extremes, may be mentioned as cor- responding witii several collierieB on tie Tyne and Wear : — and moreover, it is proposed that the lines of working, instead of being rectangular as repre- sented in Ji. 30, shall be diagonal, in order that the air may circulate more freely. It is not necessary in this place to go into the details which are given at great length in the work above named — and more especially did this omission appear immaterial, as on asking a highly respectable manager of a colliery, to whom the writer of these pages has been indebted for several valuable particulars, whether such a mode

Mb. Henzies' Scheme. 320

of working waa in aaj iBstance adopted in the coun of the projector's residence, the reply was : — " I know of no case where the workings are driven obliquely: he could only be a theorist who would recommend such a plan." The scheme of Mr. Menzies will be at once comprehended from the sketch, (Jy. 31.) representing a small tract of work- ng.31. ings, in which the

straight parallel lines on each side the main drift between the two pits A and B, are the headways, and the oblique lines (at>s8ing them, BO as to leave the pillars of coal of rhomboidal form in- stead of being paral- lelcrama as in ordi- nary cases, are the working boards : so that, supposing the downcast shaft A to be 180 yards deep, and at a distance of 1200 yards from the upcast B, which is 80 yards deep, — the strata rising at the rate of one yard in twelve — all the side workings will also rise according to their angle with the direct line of the hading or dip, towards the upper pit, and thus dischai their contami- nated air.

In concluding this Chapter, it may be added that the evolution of fire-damp in mines is in general gradual and slow: but not unfirequently great dis- chaies of it are made into the workings, from what are termed blowers. A blower is a fissure, or small opening through which the stream of inflionmable

230 Underground Works And Ventilation.

gsus rashes into the mine, in great quantity, and with considerable noise ; as if the reservoir from which it comes were under ihe pressure of a head of water, which may in some instances be the case. These jets are sometimes met with in the most perfectly ventilated collieries, where they excite no apprehen- sion : and we have known the colliers collect the gas in large bottles, which they closed with clay, carried- them home, and there, making a small hole through the clay, have lit and used them as portable gas- lamps. Blowers are said in general to proceed from the roof, but are sometimes also observed to issue from the floor of the mine. The stream of gas, how- ever strong at first, is generally found to diminish gradually and then to cease altogether. When, however, the discharge is either so great or so con- tinued as to be dangerous, it may be led by a tube the nearest way to the upcast shaft ; some part of the tube being heated to promote its motion through the conduit*. A curious method . was sometimes formerly em-

ployed in the Leicestershire mines to expel the car-

Perhaps nothing tends to give a stronger or more impressive idea of the texiible proximity to danger in which the pitman pursues his labour, than the manner in which the carburetted hydrogen is evolved above ground at one or two of the Newcastle pits, and was formerly the case also at Work- ington and Whitehaven. Not far ftom Wallsend church, a four inch pipe- connected at the pit bottom with an insulated portion of coal strata extending about four acres, is carried up as high as the head gear : from the orifice of this tube there constantly issues an ignited stream of gas forming a flag of flame, at least eight or nine feet in length. At night — and indeed during the day — this is conspicuous to a considerable distance; and on approaching the spot, such is the force with which the inflammable vapour is emitted, that it produces a sound like the roaring of a blast furnace. The immense natural gasometer in which this tremendous agent is collected, supplies the flame at the rate of eleven hogsheads per minute! There is a similar emis- sion at Willington colliery--the discharge is most vehement when the wind blows from the south cast.

Emissions Of Gas. 231

buretted hydrogen. In short distances from the main current of ventilation, ''a workman crouched upon all fours without a light, keeping his head low to prevent breaking the gas, or a mixture of it; and fastening a hook with a string through it in the roof at the extremity of the opening. He then returned, in the same manner, to the entrance with the two ends of the string in his hand : to one of these ends he fastened a lighted candle fixed in clay on a board — with the other, he drew the candle to the extremity in good air, and finally raised it to the hook in the roof, when its flame ignited the gas at that point, upon which a violent rush of atmospheric air imme- diately took place."* The introduction of the Davy lamp has, however, mostly superseded this perilous practice.

GeoL FacU, p. 96.

Chapter Xii-

Getting The Coal.

Ideas of unpleasantness and danger associated with Coal Pits in general — Few persons like to descend to inspect the subterranean workings — An interesting sight to the Visitor — Impressions experienced in traversing the deep fiery mines about Newcastle — Plan of removing the pillars which support the roof— Crushes or creeps-Working crept Coal — Appearance of the Pitmen underground — Steel mill — Use of Horses — Anecdote — Employment of Females — Implements used by the Collier — Frac- tures of the Coal — Backs, cutters, and partings — Methods of breaking down the lAve Coal — Attempts at the introduction of Machinery.

r ROM what has been stated in the preceding Chapter, a tolerably accurate idea may be formed of the underground economy of a coal mine in its general scope. It will be proper, however, to describe some of those dangerous but not unusual combina- tions of working by means of which a still greater proportion of the entire coal is obtained, and also to go a little more into detail relative to the actual operations of the colliers. As exhibitions, the minia-

Apprehensions Of Banger. 233

ture model of a coal-work in one of the fasbiona- ble Bazaars and even the Thames Tunnel, have attracted the attention of parties in the metropolis ; whfle few pewoM, actoated by curioaty merely, bave the resolution to descend a coal-pit, whether they happen to be residents or visitors in the colliery dis- tricts: this circumstance is perhaps generally attri- butable partly to the prevalence of a vague notion of danger, and connected therewith, the necessary un- pleasantness in most instances, of traversing the ex- cavations amidst the dirt and moisture commonly met with in such places*. Yet these considerations and inconveniences overcome, and they are often greater

The collieries belonging to Earl FitxwiUiam at EUecar and Rawmanhy near Rotiieifaaniy are carried on with gieal apirit, and the whole of the ar- langementB for worUng them are on a acale of great magnitude ; at the same time they are carried out with a degree of care and effect not snrpaaaed in that part of the oonntry. The workinga are not only proached by means of the drawing shaft, bat also by aftitteril or sobtenanean way, so that timid persons, who might hesitate to allow themselTes to be let down by means of the steam-engine, need be under no apprehension about entering by the inclined galleiy. There is, moreover, little or no fire damp, so that the ooU liers work with open lamps ; and so dean and commodious are the board ways, in many parts, at least, that the ladies from Wentworth Hoose, some- tiboea go down to witness the operations, and more particularly to see the impressions of organic remains with which some portions of the strata abound* The roof is beantiital, not only on account of its being in some places richly embossed with lepidodendritio impressions, but because it is for the most part, as dry, compact, and eyen as the street pavement itself. The comfortablenessof the board-ways underfoot, has been materially lessened, since the occasion when it was necessary to inundate the works with water from a neighbouring reservoir, in order to extinguish the burning of the beds of coal which had been wilftiUy set on fire. Dirty, however, as was the floor of the mine in many parts, owing to the cause first asrigned, when the author went in a few days previous to writing this paragraph, (June 1835), it was by no means impassable to curious viritors. The entrance of the footrail consists of. a neat front with two lodges of hewn stone, having between them an iron gate. One of the shafts is called the Royal William Pit, from the circumstance of his present Migesty having once, when Duke of Clarence, descended, along with some oOier illustrious guests of Eari Fltzwilliam, to inspect the workings. This august personage, is also said, previously of course to his accession to tho thronoi to have once descended into tho deep workings of a coal mine at Newcastle.

234 Getting The Coal.

in imagiaation than reality — there are few sightij more striking to an eye unajustomed to subtenanean nuning operations than are presented by those im- mense caverns, or apparently interminable galleries, in trhich the pitman pursues,

'' Howe'er the daylight smiles, or night-stonnB rave. His dangerous labour, deeper than the grave ; Alike to him, whose taper's flickering ray. Creates a dubious subterranean day. Or whether climbs the sun his noontide track. Or starless midnight reigns in coif of black ; Intrepid still — though buried at his work, Wheife ambushed deaths, and hidden dangers lark."

Besides the rarer occurrence of those ancient vege- table forms described in previous Chapters, the curi- ous visitor will commonly be interested by the more recent manifestations of organised existence. In the damp recesses of the mine, several species of the fungus family make their appearance : as these are mostiy beautifully white, sometimes filamentous, at others like tawed leather, they contrast strikingly with the sombre aspect of the coal from which they shoot. Not only are there various species of fungi met with in the forsaken workings of old coal mines, but sometimes mosses, especially the Rhizomorphaeete, or root moss. Efflorescences of mineral matters

In the ooal mines in the Ticiniiy of Dresden, the Rhizomarpka fihMfiko- rea are said to be so abundant and so laminoas, as eren to dazzle the eye by the brilliant light they afford. Mr. Erdmon, the Commissioner of Mines, thus describes the phosphorescent appearance of the Rhisomorpfas in one he Tisited : — I saw the laminoas plants here in wonderful beaaty ; the im- pression produced by the spectacle I shaU never forgot It appeared on descending into the mine, as if we were entering an enchanted castle. Tho abundance of these planta was so great, that the roof and the walls, and the pillars, were entirely covered with them ; and the beautiful light they cast around almost dazzled the eye — it resembled fsint moonshine, so that two persons near each other could readily distinguish thoir bodies. The lights appear to be most considerable when the temperature of the mines is com- paratiToly high."— Biirnf/r* OvtHncs of Botany y. p. 166.

Appearances Within The Mine. 235

of considerable interest sometimes occur — in minute capillary masses frequently : occasionally however, judging from specimens in the museums at Newcastle and other places, very fine crystals of sulphate of lime are found in the abandoned galleries of Felling colliery ; teaching/' as was lately remarked,* " im- portant truths as to the power and action of what have been called 'diurnal' geological causes."

But if courage be required to enter a coal mine at ordinary depths, it is in descendii the frightfully deep pits in the neighbourhood of Newcastle, that sensations bordering on the awful are inevitably ex- perienced ; and in traversing at such profound depths the endless galleries into which the shafls ramify, the visitor is struck by the perfection of plans adapted to lessen, as much as possible, the risk which the pitmen run in situations where the great value of the coal induces them to get it as completely as possible. On the other hand, the vast caverns formed in getting the thick Staffordshire coal, exhibit on a much more striking scale the combined operations of the miners, from the space which, when artificially illuminated, the eye cononands at once ; at the same time that persons may move about more commodiously, and also with fewer apprehensions of danger from explo- sions or foul air. A large but indifferently executed print published some years ago in Staffordshire, re- presents in a striking manner several of the opera- tions connected with getting the ten-yard coal in the old Bradley mine, near Bilston.

But whatever be the dangers or difficulties that may be encountered in carrying out the first workings, according to the plans already described, in which

In Rcporl of Yorkshire Phil. Society, 1835.

1336 Getting The Coal.

niunerous pillars or props are teA standing to support the roof, how laiely must such dangra and difficul- ties be increased, when the intrepid miner proceeds, as is often done, to work out the material of those supports !

It may be proper to premise, that in the deep northern mines, where the fioor is often as soft as the coal is tender, there sometimes occur those striking movements which are technically called crushes or creeps, or in Scotland sits. A creep is a certain pro- trusion or bursting upwards of the floor of a mine, owing to the small extent, and consequent liability to sink, of the bases of those pillars of coal which are left to support the roof durit the excavation of so much of the seam as appears compatible with safe to the pitman.

Suppose the annexed diagram (fi. 32.) to repre- Fig.33i sent a field of

coal: the oblong dark shaded por- tions will ew the pillars, and the white spaces the extent irom which the coal was dug out, in the manner de- scribed in the preceding Chap- ter, and before the working of the pillars was at- tempted. The whole of these pillars were consdered necessary for securing the roof, and no attempt was made to reduce them, previously to 1 795, from the apprehension of producing a creep. In that year,

Plans Of Underground Working.

when the Walker Collieiy became exhausted, as to the main seam, an attempt was made at partial work- ing, by removing one ha]f of every alternate pillar, as shewn in the cut By this means 55, instead of only 40, per cent, of the entire coal was obtained ; the remaining 45 per cent, being still left in the pil- lars, and consequently lost. The double lines in the transverse openings represent the air stoppings of brick-work, and the darts shew the direction of the current of air. In 1810, another improved system* was introduced — first in the working of Percy Main Colliery. The coal mines were believed to be ex- hausting so very rapidly, that an attempt was made by which every intermediate pillar was entirely taken out, and also a portion of the adjoining ones, as shewn iig. 33 in the annexed diagram

J i irirrJ I (fig. 33). By this plan,

r -, , and by working in small

p . .,j divisions, the daring

r

— 1 I—

.' L

workmen succeeded in obtaining, from the fiery collieries on the Tyne,

about eiffhty or ninety

, . . narts of the coal out of

one hundred; still the ultimate effect was, that creeps took place ; the danger was increased, and great loss of coal was the consequence.

The following diagram f (fi. 34.) explains the creep in all its progressive stages from its commence-

Mr. Bnddle'B ETldenoe.

f Taken fiom a copy of that exhibited bj Mr. Buddie in hia STidanoe before the Committee of the Honae of Lords in 1830 ; the description of Uie progress of a creep is derived from the same highly respectable authority.

Oettinq The Coal.

ment until it has completely closed all llie workings, and, as conunoulj lupens, crushed the pillars of

Fig. 34.

coal. This section supposes the spectator standing on the level of the different galleries which are opened in the seam. The daric shaded portions represent the coal piBars hetween each gallery : when those are weakened too much, or in other words, when their bases hecome too narrow for the resistance of the pavement below, by the pressure of the incumbent stratification, they sink down into the substratum, and the first appearance caused thereby, is a Uttle curvature in the bottom of each gallery a ; that is the first symptom of active creep — the pitmen, how- ever, more commonly hear than see it. The next stage is, when the pavement begins to open, with a crack longitudinally b : the third stage of active creep is when the crack is completed, and it assumes die shape of a metal ridge c : the fourth stage is that in which the metal ridge reaches the roof D. In the next stage the peak of the metal ridge becomes flattened by pressure against the roof, by means of

Creeps, Or Crushes. 239

which it is forced into a horizontal direction, and becomes quite close, £ : just at this moment, the coal pillars begin to sustain part of the pressure. In the next stage, f, the pillars take a stiU farther part of the pressure ; and lastly, the crush is said to become dead or settled, o. This final stage is complete when the metal or factitious ridge, formed by the sinking of the pillar into the pavement, bears, in common with the pillara of coal on each side, the full pressure, and the coal becomes crushed or cracked, and can no longer be worked except by a very expensive and dangerous process.

The introduction of the Davy lamp, however, has enabled the intrepid miner even to work out the por- tions of coal thus fearfully locked up by creeps : an inspection of the latter portion pf the foregoing gram, in connexion with the following, will enable the reader to comprehend the nature of the under- taking. The letters f g in the diagram, represent the coal completely crushed, and the roof resting oa the metal ridges or piUars, as already described, being the state in which, previous to 1815 the mine was commonly relinquished. To get the remaining coal, the first process is to dig through the rubbish, after which, to prevent the exfoliation of the roof, it propped with posts of timber, as shewn at h in the cut This method is pursued until the whole of the coal is extracted, when the props j are removed, if safe to do so, and the superstrata break down en masse in what the miners term a ffoqf k, and fill the space previously occupied by the seam of coal* In some cases, the thrtist or downfal of the strata, which takes place in a district where the crept pillars have been entirely worked out, not only causes vast frac-

240 Getting The Coal*

tures in the superjacent mass but occasions, more- over, a considerable subsidence of the surface.

Such are the methods of carrying out the workings — more or less intricate and dangerous — of our coal mines : it remains to describe the actual progress of getting the coal, which is the immediate object of the present Chapter. The pitmen themselves are in most collieries dressed loosely in flannel clothes, though, from the elevated temperature of the mine, they are generally almost naked above the waist. In all cases, their dress and their bodies soon become so covered with sooty matter from the pulverisation of the coal in working, that they present a peculiarly grim aspect ; and this effect is not a little heightened by the flaring of their lights, and the dark hue of the mine on every side. In some collieries they use small, and in others thick candles ; more commonly oil lamps; but generally in the north, and where fire-damp abounds, Sir Humphrey Davy's wire-gauze lanthom (which will afterwards be described) is adopted, instead of the flint and steel mill formerly employed iu the dangerous workings. Of course, where gunpowder is used, candles are also in use ; as any collections of gas that would explode by the flame of the latter, would as certainly be ignited by Fig. 3a. the firing of the former.

The figure annexed is a

side view of a steel mill of

' simple construction, a b

is a frame of iron, in which

the brass cog wheel c and

In the Life of Biownrigg, the steel mill is said to hare been the Inven- tion of a Mr. Carlisle Spedding, of WhitebaTon, to whom the same anthoritj attributes the contrivance of wooden waggon-ways.

The Steel Hill. 241

the steel mill d, are fixed by their axles so that the teeth of die former take into the pinion E of the lat- ter, thus producing a rapid revolution of the steel peripheiy, against which the piece of flint is applied, and a stream of sparks elicited. The machine is put in motion by means of the winch handle F. These mills vaiy in size, as well as in form ; in that from which the sketch was taken, the wheels were about six inches in diameter. It is sometimes fixed upon the breast of the pitman, and there worked by him ; in other cases, it is placed in the most convenient situation for use.*

Horses, as intimated in the last Chapter, and in some places asses, on account of their size, are em- ployed in Ihe workings to draw the trams, when loaded with the corves — or skips, as they are called in Staffordshire — by the putters or hurriers : in some collieries, the number of horses kept in stables under* ground is very considerable ; and as they are rarely or never drawn out, and are, therefore, constantly de- prived of the advantages of daylight and fresh air, they soon lose their sight. A misunderstanding of some statement which had probably been made to him concerning the destiny of cattle thus employed, once led Mr. Cobbett to commit a ludicrous blunder : this gentleman had been lecturing at Newcastle and adjacent towns in the autumn of 1832; in the inter- val of a week or two, the inhabitants of the neigh- bourhood were not a litde surprised to read, in the "Political Register," the following paragraph: —

The ezpente fansMvlj incomd in the article of itael miili seemt almost to exceed belief. Dr. Clanny onoe etatadi that in a ringie wcnking of a ool- Hery in the neigbboorhood of Svndeiluid, the eaqpenaa of iteel milla waa about £80 ereiy fort&ight-HR> many of them haTing to be kept at woik at a time to give any tfaiag like a iaSlcieBt lights

B

242 Getting The Coal.

Here is the most surprising thmg in the whole world; thousands of men and thousands of honres continually Hving under ground : children bom there, and who sometimes never see the surface at all, though they live to a considerable age ! ! Cohbett seems to have applied to the colliers circumstances which might have been related to him concerning the horses. To the credit of the directors of collieries on the Tyne and the Wear, there are no females employed in the workings : this, however, cannot be affirmed con- cerning the Staffordshire, Shropshire, and other coal mines : indeed, only within a few weeks of the wri- ting of this notice, three young women, sisters, were killed by an explosion of fire damp ; and another in consequence of accidentally getting her foot entangled in the ascending corfe. In Scotland, the employ- ment of the weaker sex in this laborioiis and dis- graceful manner, is very common* — as, indeed, it

In the Scotch colliefy of Gilmerton, in Mid-Lothian, which is nearly 90 fathoms in deptii, the coal, which is 6 feet thick, and lies at an angle of 40° with the horizon, is home upon the backs of women and girls flrom the Tarious workings, in wicker creels, which are fitted to the hack, and steadied by a leathern strap passing round the forehead. The regular load of a good bearer is fnm 13 to 14 stones, and the leuMineratfon aiboat one shilling pei day. These bearers have for lights small oil lamps hooked into the front of their caps ; their dress the coarsest woollen; and they generally use a very short stick, as a steadier to their precarious fboUng. The sensitive mind reTolts at the idea of females being so emplciyed ; and it is not easy to listen to any thing like an apology for the adoption of such a practice. ''The bearing system," says Mr. Dunn, " so peculiar to the coal mining of Scot- land, fteems to hare originated in working the Edge seams; and when the difficulty of applying any other means comes to be considered, necessity would appear to plead strongly for such a practice, especially at a period when the means of sinking to the deep Flat coals was so tmpesibctly under- stood ; but it is difficult to account for a system so replete with poverty shame, and demoralisation, and moreover, so destitute of veal economy, being persisted in throughout the neighbouring flat collieries. In Sheriff HaU and Edmonstonstone, not less than 250 or 300 bearers are constantiy employed."— TVons. Nut, Hiti. Soc. Northumb, vol 1. 1. 171. This was writ ten so recently as 1830, but as tram-roads were then beginning to be intro.

Partings Or Fissures. 243

formerlj was in this country, women and children bearing forth the coals on their backs/ or at least carrying them from the workings to the bottom of the shaft.

The working tools of the collier are few and sim- ple, consisting chiefly of different forms of that efficient implement the pick, being a sort of small mattock with both ends of the head pointed, and per- haps derived from a somewhat similar tool of great antiquity, figured among the Egyptian hieroglyphics. To the pick may be added small crowbars, iron ham- mers, mandrils, and wedges.

It is worthy of especial observation, in regard to the cubical structure of the coal seams in general, how beautiful a system of subordinate fructures con- duce to facilitate the separation of the mineral masses by means of the implements of the miner. Parallel to the stratification of the seam, so as to divide it into thick lamina, run what are termed partings, or spaces commonly filled with a sooty matter ; tiiere are, in the next place, successions of vertical cracks cutting through the stratum in the direction of its bearing line or level, or, according to Mr. Mammet, gene- rally observing a north and south polarity : these separations are called backs or sUnes, or by the York- shire colliers bright-heads, from the coals separating at these cleavages with clean and highly polished sur- faces, except when, as often happens, the complana- tory lustre is covered with a rusty-looking scale, or with the well-known white sparry concretion, con- sisting for the most part of carbonate of lime, derived from the infiltration of ferruginous or calcareous

daced, we may hope, for the sake of homanity, they will by this time hare, to a Iai:ge extent, nipeneded so iinbeGoming a species of labour.

R 2

244 Getting The Coal.

water ; besides these fissures, there are others pass- ing through them vertieally at right angles, and appropriately denominated cutters ; so that by means of this compound system of natural fractures, the coal, under favourable circumstances, easily breaks down in parallelopipedal masses. Of course, the structure of the coal formation in different places exhibits many and important deviations from unifor* mity in this respect.

Id proceeding to get the coal, the collier, when- ever he can do to, works upon the face of the bed, — i. e. if the seam dips towards the east, he would, if in other respects convenient, work towards the west, or otherwise in the opposite direction, and not, unless under peculiar circumstances, in the direction of north and south, or upon the end of the coal. The advantages of this mode will be obvious in connexion mth the explanation given above : the opposite course would maiufesdy be little less absurd than that of a person who, haTing to demoKsh a ma of ina>iiiy, in which all the bricks were laid lengthwise upon and in courses parallel to one another, should pursue his operations in that direction which only presented the ends of the lricks.

In working upon such a jGacc as that above de- scribed, the men in the boards or stalls first under- mine the mass, by hewing out a portion next the thill or floor of the mine. This operation is called kervrnffy or holing under ; and it is the object of the workmen to waste as little of the coal as possible; particularly where the seam is thin and of equal quality throughout ; in some instances it has a sole or footing of inferior value, which is the more cheer- fully sacrificed. In the next place, deep vertical

Hewing. 245

grooves are cut on each side of the mass intended to be lrought away, so as to define its size : it is then broken down, either by means of wedges or by the force of gunpowder ; the fonner is mostly the method adopted in Yorkshire and various other places ; the latter generally prevails in the deep mines of the more northern counties. In blasting, a hole is made about a yard in depth, and the shot insted near the roof or top of the working ; and as the effect of the explosion is much more considerable when it can be made to act mainly in the line of one of the ver- tical back fissures above described, the collier, whose habit it is to set these shots, acquires such an exact perception of the nature of the substance which he penetrates, that he can generally pronounce when his chisel reaches one of these polished faces.

It is not uncommon in working fiery seams of coal, for a jet of gas to issue at the hole which is driven for setting the shot ; this takes fire at the lamp or candle, and if suffered to extend, might lead to serious explosions : it is generally, however, unless a considerable reservoir has been tapped, readily doused or beaten out with a bag kept for that purpose. In some cases, when the gas is not easily extinguished, a small cannon is fired, and the concussion caused will sometimes produce the desired effect. Besides the danger always attendant upon the irregular igbi-i tion of the gunpowder and emissions of gas, there is another and sometimes fatal casualty to which the miner in this department of his labour is liable, owing to the sudden and unexpected separation at the slines of a deep facing or wall of coal from the mass, when the under portion has been removed, or during that operation.

246 Getting The Coal.

The nature of these underground operations pre- cludes, in general, the substitution of machinery for direct manual labour, though various experiments have at different times been made with reference to that object. One of the contrivances for this purpose best known in the north, was a machine called, from the inventor, " Willy Brown's Iron Man," which was introduced into Willington Colliery about 60 years ago. This agent was to have done the work of a giant, but as he required a strong man to work him, and another to direct his blow, he was soon laid aside. In addition to the above, it may be mentioned that the late Mr. Wood, of Newcastie, invented a machine to driU, and drive the wedges into the coal, in order to bring the top down without the aid of gunpowder. This contrivance consisted of a sort of elevated rail- way, along which was pushed a large and heavy iron ram, managed by two men, which struck the drill or chisel so as first to open a space of a few inches, after which the wedge was introduced and driven up by means of the ram, until the mass was brought down. It was calculated that this method would spare that shaking, and consequent breakage of the coal, which take place when gunpowder is used. One cargo of coals was wrought by this means in the colliery of Messrs. Brandling at Gosforth, and sent to London ; but the extra expense of working, and cost of ma- chine, rendered it like Willy Brown's Iron Man — thing of curiosity rather than of use, and it has long been laid aside. Some attempts have also been made to bring down the coal by means of forcing into the mass inunense taper screws.

Chaptee Xiii.

Underground Accidents.

Various dangers to which the Cottier is exposed — Falling of matters from the roof of the Mine — Cauldron bottoms, heU moulds and hleas — Irrup turns of Water — Instances of Flooding — Occur- rence of Subterranean Fires from natural, acci- dental, and wUfid causes — Explosions from injlam- mahle Gas — Dreadful Accident at Felling Cottiery — Details of the Catastrophe — Fire Damp and Choke Damp.

JL HE dangers with which the Collier has to contend, and the accidents to which he is liable while pursuing his gloomy ayocations, may be comprised generally under three classes, namely — 1. Matter falling from the roof, or some other part of the mine ; 2. Irrup- tions of water ; and 3. Fire damp. Instances of the former kind are comparatively rare, and always of local occurrence : so that although large quantities of shattery roof may sometimes fall down, and sud- denly bury the miner, or masses of coal, inadvertently loosened, may occasionally descend and crush him to death, accidents from these causes are very mfre- quent, as they are generally to be avoided by the

248 Underground Accidents.

exercise of due precaution on the part of the work- men. Indeed, when we reflect upon the manner in which the benks and boards are excavated, and also take into the account the enormous masses of super- incumbent matter constantly impending overhead, and the sufficient cohesion of which can be, in many instances, but imperfectly ascertained,— our surprise need not be, that we now and then hear of the occur- rence of a fatal casualty from this source, but rather, that we hear of so few. The roof of the coal is in some mines rendered highly dangerous by the occur- rence of what are sometimes called cauldron bot- toms*'*; in others, it becomes exceedingly shattery and infirm, owing to the profusion of casts of stems intermixed with its substance. As these fossils have commonly a glossy coating of coal or jet, they some- times suddenly drop out, to the imminent danger of flie workmen, who, however, are generally aware of the impending evil. In the pits about Bristol, a sometimes fatal annoyance of this character is occa- sionally encountered. In the red sandstone above the coal, a remarkable formation of globular nodules, (oblated, however, at the bottom, and on that account locally called beU moulds,'') is sometimes found in the heart of the rock, separated by a thick coating of oxide of iron. They are known to the colliers by fatal experience ; for, while the miner is working in an inclined position, which is the case where the beds of coal are thin, the continued strokes of his pick-axe

These dangerone foasils oocar In the roof of the Benehain coal eeain in the Wallaend collieries. The excellent Mr. Reay, of CarriUe, whose thigh was dreadfully fractured some years ago by the sodden descent of one of these cauldrons," which at the same time lolled the pitman at work near him, told the writer of this note that the mass was so large as to require six or eight men to lift it oS the suifeier.

Dangers From Falling Matter. 249

gradually loosens the bell mouldy which eventaallj drops out of its socket and kills or injures him with* out tlie least warning.* These lumps appear to re* semble the nodules of bituminous shale encountered in the soft roofs of some Scotch collieries : they have a sort of unctuous smoothness, and are called by the miners creeshy, or greasy bleas. This oily smooth- ness, says Williamsf makes these irregular strata particularly troublesome and dangerous in a coal roof, as being thus foil of joints and natoial divisions, which run in all directions, the oil runs through all the joints, and occasions this sort of bleas to slip and fall out so soon as the coal is worked away from under it

In Yorkshire, the rertical fissures already alluded to are called 'bright heads," or 'smooth heads," from the usually polished appearance of the coal at these sutures. This fissile structure of the rock, while it tends greatly to facilitate the labour of the pitman in riving down large masses of coal, is at the same time a frequent cause of accidents. When the workman has been for some time engaged in what is termed holing under" — that is, undermining, — the wall of coal, apparently solid and firm, will sometimes suddenly give way, separating at the line of section formed by the bright heads," and thus either bury the unfortunate excavator, or crush those who may happen to be in the way : casualties of tiiis kind are of frequent occurrence.

More frequent and fatal are the calamities arising from sudden irruptions of water into the workings, in consequence of which the men are drowned before they can reach either the shaft, or any elevated le-

Chilcott'i Bristol Guide. f MinenJ Kingdom, toI. i. p. 83.

250 Underground Accidents.

vel. A catastrophe of this class may occur, either in consequence of the miner unwarily tapping some concealed reservoir, or, as is more commonly the case, from the descent of a body of water through the intervening stratum, as when the Tunnel under the Thames was, on one occasion, suddenly inundated and, short as was the excavation, and ready the means of ascent, several lives were lost by this bursting of the river through its bed. Accidents from this, as well as from the former source, depending as they do upon mechanical causes, may often be guarded against ; though no degree of ingenuity or circum- spection on the part of the overlookers, nor of pre- caution in the conduct of the colliers combined, can always prevent their occurrence. In 1833, the Lady and Isabella pits at Workington were suddenly in- undated, by the bursting-in of an immense torrent from the old workings. There were thirty men underground at the time of the accident, who were rescued, with the exception of four, who fell victims. At Heaton Colliery, in the county of Durham, the

A catastrophe which occurred in conseqoenoe of a sudden irruption of water into the pits at East Aidsley, near Wakefield, in June 1809, when ten indi?iduals perished, has been made the sult of a Drama, by the Rev. J. Flumptre, BJ). Vicar of Oxeat Gransden, Herts, entitled Kendrew, or tha Coal Mine." The author sajs in his preface, that haTing TiAted a coal mine, at the Heaton Colliery, near Newcastle, in the summer of 1799, he adopted that as the foundation of his scenery : and endeaTonred so to con* struct his piece, that, should it ever be performed, the audience might have an opportunity of having the interior of a coal mine, to which we are in- debted for so much comfort, as it were presented and realised to them." It is not likely, however, that the drama was ever recited on the stage : the first act opens with a scene representing the top of the shaft, with the draw- ing machinery, &c, and a pitman singing a song, of which the following is the first verse: —

Although the poor collier is dirty and grim, The world yet derives great advantage from him : Whilst you sit in your houses secure from the storm, liis labour contributes to make you so warm.*'

Irruptions Of Water. 251

consequences of an irruption of water from the tap- ping of an old working, were, on one occasion, in 1815, much more deplorable, only eighteen or twenty men out of an hundred making their escape !

It will readily be conceived that the sound and appearance of an instantaneous rushing of a large body of wa&r into the workings, must be awful indeed to diosc ingulphed therein — particularly when the lights are mostly or entirely extinguished ! One of the earliest boyish impreadons which the writer retains is connected with an event of this nature, which occurred in a Yorkshire colliery in the begin- ning of the year 1805. The bottom of a large dam suddenly irave way, and poured its contents into the liverance of himself and fellows in verse, the medioc- rity of which was relieved by the real impressiveness of the occurrence, thus sang : —

" It early in the morning was our troubles did begin ; Near two o'clock, we understand, the waters rushed in : Then many waded in the deep in such a wretched plight. Their case, it dreary was indeed — they had no kind of light ! To hear the cries, and see the tears on this occasion shed. The tragic scene, it was enough to cause the heart to bleed : But the all-seeing eye of God, from whom we draw our breath. Beheld, and by his Providence, preserved us all from death," &c.

In July, 1833, the Scotch newspapers- contained a striking account of an accident of this nature ; happily resembling the above also, in the fact of its being unattended by loss of life On the 20th of June, in the forenoon, while Mr. Montgomery, banker, in Irvine, and another gentleman, were engaged in fishing on the river Gamock, nearly opposite to where they were standing, a slight eruption took place in the current of the river, which they at first supposed

252 Underground Accidents.

to be occasioned by the leap of a salmon; but the gurgling motion which succeeded, led them to sup- pose that something serious had occurred, and that the river had broken into the coal mines which sur- rounded the place on which they stood. They im- mediately hastened to the nearest pit mouth, and stated their suspicions, which the pit headman at first was slow to believe, and it was only after Mr. Mont- gomeiy had strongly remonstrated with him, that he at length prepared to avert the danger. By this time, however, the men below had heard the rushing forward of the water, and were making the best of their way to the bottom of the shaft ; but before they reached it, several were up to their necks in water> and in two minutes more, it was believed, every one of them would have been drowned. Immediately on the whole of the men being got out of the pits, Mr. Dodds, the active manager of the works, assembled all his men at the cavity in the bed of the river, over which they placed a coal-lighter, laden with such things as they thought calculated to stop the rush of the water, as straw, whins, clay, &c. j all their efforts however, proved unavailing, for the water continued to pour into the mines without obstruction, producing comparatively very little agitation on the surface of the river until the foUowing aitemoon, when a tre- mendous large space broke down, which in a short time engulphed the whole body of the stream, leaving the bed of the river quite dry for more than a mile on each side of the aperture, where there had previously been a depth of fully six feet. At this time, the fishes in the channel were seen leaping about in every direction. On the flowing of the tide the depth of the water betwixt the chasm and the sea increased to

Irruptions Of Water. 353

about niiie feet ; then the desolation was awful ! The long sweep, and prodigious quantity of water rushinir into the chasm at this time made the siirht impye beyond description. Thiee men, who were in a boat near the spot, had a very narrow escape from being sucked into the vortex, for no sooner had the men got out than the boat was drawn down with fearful rapidity. The great body of water continued to pour down the chasm, until the whole workings of the pits, which extend for many miles, were completely filled ; after which the river gradually assumed its natural appearance, and the water at- tained its ordinary level. At this time, the pressure in the pits became so great, from the immense weight of water impelled into them, that the confined air, which had been forced back into the high workings, burst through the surface of the earth in a thousand places, and many acres of ground were to be seen all at once bubbling up like the boiling of a cauldron. In some places the current was so impetuous as to form cavities four or five feet in diameter, and pro- duced a roaring noise, like the escape of steam from an overcharged boiler. Immense quantities of sand and water were thrown up like showers of rain during five hours, and iu the course of a short time the whole of Bartonholme, Longford, Snodgrass, and Nether- mains, were laid nnder water, by which calamity from five to six hundred persons, men, women, and chil- dren, were entirely deprived of emplojnment. By this unfortunate occurrence, the extensive colliery woiks in question were injured to an extent which almost precludes the hope of their ever being restored to their former state. The occurrence of fires, although commonly more

354 Underground Accidents.

injurious to the mine than dangerous to the work- men, demands at least a passing notice. Fires some- times occur spontaneously, from the decomposition of iron pyrites in contact with moisture 3 more fre- quently, they are occasioned by explosions of inflam- mable gas, or other accidentsf ; and occasionally, it is painful to add, they are kindled by the hand of the incendiaiy. In either case, the waste of coal, and injury to the works, must often be very considerable. Many instances of fires from the first cause, are on record§ ; the combustion of large heaps of matter

An interesting instance of spontaneous combustion was fonnerly seen — indeed Dr. Brewster says it exists at this moment, near the Yiilage of Maiden Bradley, near Btlston, in Staffordshire. The earth is here on fire, and this fire has continued for nearly sixty years, and has resisted every attempt that has been made to extinguish it. This fire, which has reduced many acres of land to a mere calx, arises from a bumiug stratum of coal about four feet thick, and eight or ten yards deep, to which the air has fiee access, in conse- quence of the main coal having been dug from beneath it The surface of the ground is sometimes ooTered for many yards with such quantities of sulphur, that it can be easily gathered. The calx has been found to be an excellent material for the roads, and the worlunen who collect it, often find large beds of alum of excellent quality.

f We belie?e there is no instance on record of any coal seam in England having ever been fired by lightning. In Fifeshire, however, as we are as- sured by Scotch gentlemen, the exposed basset-edges of the strata have been kindled through such agency.

X The colliery of Earl Fitzwilliam, at Rawmarsh, near Rotherham, was wilftilly fired in 1833, as another of his Lordship's pits had been on a former occasion of some dissatisfaction among the workmen* The punishment awarded by law for wilfully and maliciously setting on fire any mine, pit, or delph of coal, or cannel coal, is felony without benefit of clergy." 10 Geo. II. c. 32. And " setting fire to, demolishing, or otherwise damaging, any engine or any other thing belonging to coal mines, is felony and transpor- tation for seven years." 9 Geo. III. c. 29.

§ In 1830, the Stirling Journal contained the following singular notice : — It is now more than two years since the snow lying on a field on the farm of Shaw Park, belonging to the Earl of Mansfield, was observed to melt almost as soon as it fell, and then rise in a state of vapour. The phenomenon attracted the attention of the Managers of the Alloa and Devon CoUieries, and was found to be the eflect of the heat produced by a stratum of coal in a state of ignition, technically known by the name of the Nine Feet Seam, firom which the Devon Ironworks are supplied with a large proportion of their fel.

Fires From Various Causes. 265

about the pit's mouth so originated, is very common ; and there have been some striking instances of a similar occurrence, on board coal ships, both before leaving the river Tyne, and when at sea. Conside- rable devastation was caused on Newcastle Town Moor, by the accidental firing of the coal strata near the village of Benwell, about the middle of the seven- teenth century ; traces of this pseudo volcano, are still clearly visible in the red shale, cinders, and other charred matter with which the ground is strown, about the adjacent estate of Fenham.* The most re- markable instances, however, of devastation from these causes, are those near the towns of Wednes- bury, in Staffordshire, and Dudley, in Worcester- shire : here, there are vast masses of coal on fire, which have been burning for ages, owing, as is sup- posed, to the decomposition of pyrites.

Various plans were, at the same time, saggested to extingiiisli tbe flames and after aereral fulares it was determined to cut a mine round the seam to prerent their eitenrion. Workmen were set to excayate this mine, which was opened at both sides of the seam, to build a wall as they proceeded, on the sides of the two tunnels next the fire. In this way it was intended to proceed, till the tonnds penetrated beyond the fire, when they were to be joined in the form of a horse-shoe, and thns cut off, by means of a strong wan, all connexion between the ignited part of the seam and the remainder of it This plan has been perseyered in for a year and a half, but has never been completed. The workmen have often brought two walls within a few fathoms of meeting, but owing to the fire bursting in npon them, they haye been hitherto obliged to fall back again and take a wider circle. Six or seyen shafts haye been sank to yentiUite tnnnels, in which the heat is frequently so great as to raise the thermometer finom 212 to 230 deg. Fahrenheit ; it sometimes rises eren higher. The lamps of the miners, which are hung npon the walls, have more than once fallen to pieces fom extreme heat."

In 1673, Mr. Durant, of Newcastle, transmitted an account of this subteiranean conflagration to the celebrated Robert Boyle, who laid it before the Royal Society. It appears that at that time the fire had been burning about thirty years ; it was occasioned by a candle negligently placed by a pitman while at work, and was at first of such small account, that it is said half-a-crown was denied to a man who, for that trifling sum, would hay undertaken to extinguish it

Underground Accidents.

The most Rwfal, the mort btal, and, it is lamentable to add, the most firequentl j occoning accidents, are those nmkfr fipom Uie accmnuladon of inflammable gas, or mepbitic vsonr. The mere enmneration of the instances in idiich men hare been scorched, stifled*, and snddenlj honied into eternity singly, or bj sooiesy would occupy a large space. Instead, howerer, of attempting to give at length, such a catalogue calamities, it may be sufficient to detail from the account of the Rev. J. Hodgson, already quoted in the description of Felling Colliery, the paitkulus otihe eiqplosion which took place there in 1812, and the melancholy circumstances attending the catastrophe. The general plan of the colliery has been already described, and the fact stated that, the mine, up to the moment of the accident, was con- sidered by the woikmen, a model of perfection in all its arrangements. In the forenoon of the 25th of May, 1812, the villages in the neighbourhood of this ciJliery were alarmed by a tremendous explosion. Hie subterraneous fire broke forth with two heavy discharges finom the John Pit; followed by one firom the WiUiam Pit. A slight trembling, as firom an earthquake, was felt for about half a mile round the workings ; and the noise of the explosion, though dull, was heard to three or four miles distance, and much

An elegant writer (Dr. Walah) has thus poetically described two of the less common haibingers of choice damp and fire damp, those ministers of death, whose approach is flreqnenay as inridious as it is destructiTe. one tiase, an odour of the most fragrant kind is diffosed tfaxongh the mine, neemhfing tiie teent of the sweetest flowers; and while the miner is inhaling Iba Mmy gale he is snddeidj siradr down and ezfrixes in the midst of hia Aoeied ejoynent: at another, it oomes in the Ibim of a globe of air en- doaed in a filmy case; and while he is gaadng on the light and beaatifta el||eot floating ahmg, and ia tempted to take it in his hand, it fiaddenly er- plodesy and destroys him and his companions in an instant"

Explosions Of Gas, 257

resembled an unsteady fire of infantry* Immense quantities of dost and small coal accompanied these blasts, and rose high into the air in the form of an inverted cone. The heaviest part of the ejected matter, such as corves, pieces of wood, and small coal, fell near the pit ; but the dust, borne away by a strong west wind, fell in a continued shower jGrom the pit to the distance of a mile and a half. In the village of Heworth, it caused a darkness like that of early twi- %ht, and covered the roads so thickly, that the foot- steps of passengers were strongly imprinted in it. The heads of both the shaft-frames were blown off, their sides set on fire, and their pullies shattered in pieces — those of the John Pit gin, being on a crane not within the influence of the blast, were preserved. The coal dust, ejected firom the William Pit into the drift or horizontal parts of the tube, was about three inches thick, and soon burnt to a light cinder. Pieces of burning coal, driven off the solid stratum of the mine, were also blown up this shaft.

As soon as the explosion was heard, the wives and children of the colliers ran to the working pit. Wild- ness and terror were pictured in every countenance. The crowd firom all sides soon collected, to the num- ber of several hundreds, some crying out for a hus- band, others for a parent, or a son ; and all deeply affected with an admixture of horror, anxiety, and grief. The machine being rendered useless by the irruption, the rope of the gin was sent down the pit with all expedition. In the absence of horses, a number of men, whom the wish to be instrumental in rescuing their neighbours fix)m their perilous situa- tion, seemed to supply with strength proportionate to the urgency of die occasion, put thqir shoulders to the

s

,1

2d8 UNDERGROUND ACCIDENTS.

shafts of the gin, and wrought it with astonishing expedition. By twelve o'clock, thirtj-two persons, all that sxtrviyed this dreadful calamily, were brought to daylight, and along with them the dead bodies of two boys — three other boys dying in a few hours. Only twenty-niae persons were, therefore, left to relate what they observed of the appearances and effects of this subterraneous thundering: one hundred and twenty-one were in the mine when it happened, and eighty-seven remained in the workings. Eight persons had come up at different intervals, a short time before the explosion. It is impossible to describe the shrieks, bowlings, and wringing of hands which characterised the persons on the spot at this crisis : they who had their friends restored, hastened with them from the dismal scene, and seemed, as Mr. Hodgson remarks, for a while to suffer as mnch from excess of joy as they had lately done from grief.

The persons who remained in the mine, had all been employed in the workings to which the plane- board WM the general avenue, and as none had escaped by that way, the most intense apprehension for their safety existed. At noon, nine courageous individuals descended the John Pit in expectation of meeting with some of them alive. As the fire damp would have ignited at candles, they lighted their way by steel mills, the machines already described, which give light by turning a plain thin cylinder of steel against a piece of flint. Knowing that a great num- ber of the workmen would be at the crane when the explosion happened, they attempted to reach it by the plane-board : but their progress was intercepted at the second pillar by the prevalence of choke-damp — the sparks from the steel-mill falling into the

Accident At Felling* 299

noxious fluid like drops of blood. Being, therefore, deprived of light, and nearly poisoned for want of atmospheric air, they retraced their steps to the shaft, and then attempted to pass up the narrow boards : in these, they were stopped at the sixth pillar by a thick smoke, which stood like a wall the whole height of the board. With difficulty, they found their way to the pit bottom, persuaded that die mine was on fire, and before they had all ascended another explosion, though much less severe than the first, took place. The men at the bottom, saved themselves by sud- denly lying down on their faces — though they felt the heat and energy of the blast very seriously.

As these adventurous men were successively drawn to bank, all their reports as to the chance of any person remaining alive in the mine, were equally hopeless : notwithstanding, however, their statements, and the corroborating circumstance of the second ex- plosion, persons were not wanting to infect the minds of the relatives of the sufferers with disbelief in the accounts of the persons who had explored the mine. It was suggested that want of courage, or bribery, might be the inducements to magnify the dangers, and represent the impossibility of reaching the bodies of the unfortunate men. By means of this species of wicked industry, the grief of the neighbourhood began to assume an irritable and gloomy aspect. The proposition to exclude the atmospheric air firom the mine, in order to extinguish tiie fire, was there- fore received with cries of " Murder,'* and with de- terminations of opposing the proceeding. Many of the widows continued about the mouth of the John Pit during the whole of the night, with the hope of hearing the voice of a husband or a son calling for

s2

200 Underground Accidents.

assistance. On the* day after the accident an im- mense crowd, of colliers from various parts, assembled round the pits, and were profuse in reproaches on the persons concerned in the mane, for want of ex- ertion to recover the men. Every one had some example to relate of successftd attempts in exigencies of this kind, — all were large in their professions of readiness to give assistance but none were found to enter the inflammable jaws of the mine, though the proprietors gave the strongest assurances to the crowd, that if any project could be framed for the recovery of the men, no expense should be spared in executing it ; if any person could be found to enter the mine, every facilily and help should be afforded Mm ; but, as diey were assured by the unanimous tipinion of several of the most eminent Viewers in the neighbourhood, that the workings of the mine were in an unapproachable state, they would hold out no reward for the attempt : they would be accessary to no man's death by persuasion or br3>e.

After another ineffectual attempt to proceed from the shaft towards the workings, the hope was aban- doned, and it was resolved to exclude the atmospheric air, in order to extinguish the fire which the explo- sion had kindled in the mine, and of which the smoke ascending the William Pit, was a sure indication. This shaft was accordingly filled with clay about seven. feet above the mgate or entrance into the drift; and the John Pit moutib was covered over with loose planks. In two days aft:erwards, twenty fothers o( additional clay were thrown into the William Pit, in order to insure its being air-tight : in the next place, a scaffold, at 35i fathoms from the surface, was sus- pended on side ropes, each six inches in circum-

The Mine On Fire. 261

ference in the John Pit Upon this a large quantity of straw, and afterwards twentysix fothers of daj were thrown, to render the whole air tight On ihe 1st of June, this suspended mass fell into the pit; and also another, subsequently constructed : at leng a scaffolding of planks on stout beams of timber was laid across.

Preparatory to re-opening the mine, a brattice ov thin partition of deals, was put down the William Pit, and intended, by promoting a temporary angulation. &c. to assist the workmen in raising the clay and other matters which had been previously thrown down. About this tame many idle tales were circu- lated through the country concerning several of the men finding their way to the shafts, and being re- covered. Their number was circumstantially told — how they subsisted on candles, oats, and beans — bow they heard the persons, who visited the mine at the time of the accident, but were too feeble to speak sufficiently loud to make themselves heard* Some conjuror, too, it was said, had set his spells and his divinations to work, and penetrated the whole secrets of the mine. He had discovered one famishing group receiving drops of water from the roof of the mine— another eating their shoes and clothes, and other such pictures of misery. These inventiolis were carefully related to the families of the colliers,

up their sorrows afresh. Indeed it seemed the chief employment of some to make a kind of insane sport of dieir own and their neighbour's calamity.

On the 19th of June, the water oozing out of the tubbing of the William Pit, had risen to the height of twenty-four feet upon the clay. On the

362 Underground Accidents.

3d of Jolj, this being all overcome the brattice finished and a great part of the claj drawn up, the sinkers began to bore a creep-hole out of the shaft into the north drift. On the next day, the stoppings in the tube drift of the John Pit were taken down, and the bore-hole finished, through which th.e air passed briskly into the mine, and ascended by the John Fit tube : and after a few days, the vapour issuing, which in the beginning took fire on the ap- plication of a candle, lost that property in conse* quence of the influx of atmospheric air.

The workmen having pierced into the drift, through the clay in the William Pit, and the morning of the 8th of July being appointed for entering the work- ings, the distress of the neighbourhood was again renewed at an early hour. A great concourse of people collected — some out of curiosity — to witness the commencement of an undertaking full of sadness and danger — some to stir up the revenge and ag- gravate the sorrows of the relatives of the sufferers, by calumnies and reproaches, published for the sole purposes of mischief; but the greater part came with broken hearts and streaming eyes, in expectation of seeing a father, a husband, or son, brought up out of the horrible pit.'" As the weather was warm, and as it was desirable that as much air might pass down the pit as possible, constables were placed to keep off the crowd : two surgeons were also in attendance in case of accidents.

Nine persons descended the William Pit, and as a current of water had been thrown down during ten hours, they found it practicable to traverse the north drift towards the plane board, lighting their way by means of steel mills. The shifts of men employed

Dead Bodies Brought Out. 2M

in this doleful and unwholesome search, were gene- rally about eight in number : they were four hours in and eight hours out of the mine. The first body was found near the plane-board ; and for a while tli men stood over it in speechless horror, imagining that it was in such a state of decomposition that it would &JI asunder in lifting into the coffin. At length they began to encourage one another in the name of Gh)d," to begin : and after several hesitations mnd resolutions, and covering their hands with oakum to avoid any unpleasant sensation in touching the body, they laid it in a shell, which was drawn to bank," on a bier constructed for the purpose. When the first shift of men came up, at ten o'clock, a mes<- sage was sent for a number of coffins to be in readi- ness at the pit : these being at the joiner's shop piled up in a heap, to the number of ninety-two, — most gloomy sight ! — had to pass Low Felling. As soon as a cart load them was seen, the bowlings of the women, who had hitherto continued in their houses, but now began to assemble about their doors came on the breeze in slow fitful gusts, which pre;- saged a scene of much distress and confusion being soon exhibited near the pit ; but happily, by repre- senting to them the shocking appearance of the body that had been found, and the ill effects upon their bodies and minds, likely to ensue fix>m suffering themselves to be hurried away by such violent con- vulsions of grief, they either returned to their houses, or continued in silence in the neighbourhood of the pit Mr. Hodgson details with much minuteness the dicumstances in whidi the bodies of the sufferers were respectively discovered — sometimes buried be- neath the fall of the roof, but mostly lying exactly in

264 Underground Accidents.

the position in which they appeared to have been thrown at the moment of the explosion. In one place twenty-one bodies lay together in ghastly con- fusion: some like mnmmies, scorched as dry as if they had been baked. One wanted its head, another its arm. The scene was troly fiightfhl. The power of fire was visible upon aU ; but its effects were ex- tremely various; while some were almost torn to pieces, there were others who appeared as if they had sunk down overpowered with sleep. At the bottom of the plane-board, the body of a mangled horse and four shattered wagons were found : the latter were made of strong frames of oak, strengthened with hoops and bars of iron, yet the blast had driven both them and the horse with such violence down the in elined plane-board that it had twisted and shattered them, as if they had been shot firom a mortar against a rock.

On one occasion during the progress of raising the bodies, and while the workmen were clearing out the water-sumph or well, which had been sank at the bottom of the John Pit to collect the water that drained through the tubbing, a gust of fire-damp burst from the workings, and ascended the shaft. This caused so great an alarm,' that the cry 'Send away a loop !" f5rom the bottom, and " Ride away ! Ride away!" from the banksmen, were heard to- gether. Seven of the men clung to the rope, and arrived safe at bank ; and two old men threw them- selves flat on their faces, in expectation of an explo- sion ; but after a second and similar eructation, the atmospheric current took its usual course. This phenomenon was afterwards ascertained to proceed from a laie fall at that time taking place in the

Interment Of The Sufferers. 265

Stable boards and forcing badL a foul admixture of the two damps and common air. The banksman's cry 80 alarmed the villages of High and Low Fellings that all the inhabitants joung and old, hastened to the pit.

From the 8th of July to the 19th of September, the heart>rending scene of mothers and widows ex* amining the patrid bodies of their sons and husbands, for marks by which to identify thrai, was almost daily renewed but very few of them were known by toy personal mark — they were too much mangled and scorched to retain any of their features. Their clothes, tobacco boxes, shoes, and the like, were> therefore, the only indexes by which they coiQd be recognised. Every family had made provision for the entertainment of their nehbours on the day the bodies of their Mends were recovered; and it had been generally given out that they intended to take the bodies into their own houses. But Dr. Ramsay having given his opinion that such a proceeding, if carried into effect, might spread putrid fever through the neighbourhood, they, after seeing the first body, readily consented to have them interred immediately after they were found — the hearse, however, on its way to the burying ground, passed by the door of the deceased. One of the bodies was never found : of the ninety-one recovered, all except four, we in- terred in Heworth Chapel-yard, in a trench side by side, two coffins deep, with a partition of brick and lime between every four coffins : a neat obelisk, nine feet high, was afterwards erected over this immense grave : it records on four brass plates the names and ages of the sufferers.

On the 19th of September the ventilation of the

966 Underground Accidents.

CoUieiy was effected completely, and the workmen resumed their labours ; but in little more than a year — namely, on the 24th December, 1813, another ex- plosion occurred in the same mine, and killed twenty- three persons, and twelve horses ; twenty-one indi viduals escaped, thirteen of whom were severely burnt. This explosion was certainly every way much less severe than the former ; but as it happened when the morning shift of men were relieving the night shift, it might have been much more destructive than in fact it was : for a group of the fresh men were waiting to go down ; and those who had just descended met the fatal whirlwind of fire in their way to the southern boards, which Ue under the village of High Felling. That part of the mine was inter* fleeted with several dykes and fissures, which not unfrequently discharged great quantities of inflam** mable air, through the apertures called blowers, al* ready described, and which made the small coals on the floor dance round their orifices, like gravel in a strong spring. Whether (his accident was attribu. table to the fitUing of some matter so as to prevent the regular ventilation of the wastes, or to some neglect of the standing orders at the rarifying fur- nace in the upcast pit, could not be satisfactorily discovered ; but so powerful was the stream of fre air in all the workings, that the persons employed were unanimous in declaring, that they never wrought in a pit so wholesome and pleasant

While the present sheet is passing through the press, the immediate neighbourhood of the above- mentioned accidents is in a state of indescribable dis- traction, in consequence of the occurrence of a catas- trophe similar in nature, but still more disastrous in

Explosion At Wallsend. 267

the amount of fatality connected with it ; indeed the oldest inhabitants of the district do not remember any thing equal to it as regards loss of life. On the after- noon of June 18th, 1835, an explosion of inflammable gas took place in the works of what is called the Church Pit,*' in the Wallsend Colliery, by which one hundred and one human beings — about tiuree-fourths of them boys — were suddenly hunied into eternity ! It is unnecessary to go into the details of this appal- ling calamity : it may, however, be remarked diat the works, which had been regularly inspected in the morning by the '' under viewers,'' were consi- dered in every respect safe and secure ; so that whe- ther the accident is to be referred to some of the miners having incautiously removed the head of their safety lamps, or to some other cause, will probably ever remain a mystery; as four persons — ell who were saved— -can give no account of the affair. Se- veral of the bodies were black, shrivelled, and burnt ; one or two were mutilated ; but the greater number, as commonly happens in these cases, having been suffocated by the stythe or after-damp, had the ap- pearance of being in a tranquil sleep. It appeared, indeed, from evidence offered on the Coroner's in- quest, that by far the greater part of the sufferers had deliberately left the spot where they were at work on hearing the explosion, and would in all probability have been saved, had not the fire-blast blown down various matters, so as to obstruct ventilation and ascent by the main shaft ; and thus the victims pe- rished by unexpected suffocation when fleeing for their lives. In 1821 there was an explosion in the same colliery, by which fifty-two lives were lost.

Chapter Xiv.

The Safety Lamp.

Circumstances which led to the formation of a Society for Preventing Accidents w Collieries — Application to Sir Humphrey Davy — Chemical Composition of the inflammahU Gas of the Mines— WiU fwt explode in small Tubes, nor from contact with red-hot Iron or Charcoal — First Safe Lantern — Wire-Gduze Cage — Description of the Common Safety Lamp — Testimonials of respet to Sir H. Davy — Opinions of Mr. Buddie and Mr. Fenwick in favour of the " Davy " — Petition of the Staffordshire Colliers — Circumstances under which Explosions have taken place in connexion with the Davy Lamp.

xF the appalling circumstances detailed in the pre- ceding Chester, comprising, as they do, but a very small part of the catalogue of calamities of that class, are calculated to make the least sensitive individual shudder with horror, by how much more must the public, and the pitmen especially, have been laid under obligation by those persons who have devised the means of lessening the number of such occur- rences—or rather, invented a method of prevent- ing them altogether. It was impossible, says Dr.

Benevolent Exertions. 269

Paris, after alluding to the fbrst catastrophe at Felling Colliery, that an event of such awM magnitude should not have deeply affected every humane per- son resident in the district. Nothing, in short, could exceed the anxiety which was manifested on the occa- sion i but most unfortunately there existed an invin* cible prejudice against every proposition that could be offered, from a general impression of the utter hopelessness of any attempt to discover a remedy. A few philosophic individuals, however, did form themselves into an association for the laudable pur- pose of inviting the attention of scientific men to the subject, and of obtaining from them any suggestions which might lead to a more secure method of lighting the mines.

To the Rev. Doctor Gray, the late Bishop of Bristol, and who, at the period of the explosions at Felling, was Rector of Bishop-Wearmouth, Dr. Pa- ris acknowledges himself indebted for the sevand highly interesting communications, by means of which he has been enabled to present to the scien- tific world a complete history of those proceedings which have so happily led to a discovery, of which it is not too much to say that it is, at once, the pride of science, the triumph of humanity, and the glory of the age in which we live.*' It was at a time when all relief was deemed hopeless, that Mr. Wilkinson, a barrister in London, and a gentleman distinguished for the humanity of his disposition, suggested tlie

" Life of Sir Hmnphnj DaTy, by J. A. PariB, M.D. ko," From this soQioey as considered the most circumstantial and authentic, the present Chapter, on the sabject of the Safety Lamp, is chiefly drawn. The work is altogedier one of delightfU inteiest There hare been several claimants of, and endless discussions upon, the inyention of the Safety Lamp, explicit allusion to which will be found in the work here mentioned.

270 The Safety Lamp.

expediency of establishing a Society for the purpose of enqiming whether any, and what methods of secnrity could be adopted for the prevention of those accidents at that time so frequently occurring in the collieries of Nor&umberland and Durham. In con- sequence of this benevolent suggestion a Society was established at Bishop- Wearmouth, on the 1st of October, 1813. A. few days before the first meeting, twenty-seven persons had been killed in a colliery in which Sir Ralph Milbanke had an interest ; he was, therefore, called upon at the first meeting to state the particulars of the accident. At that time, as Dr. Gray states, there was such little expectation that any means could be devised to prevent the oc- currence of these explosions, that the object of the gentlemen who convened the meeting, however hu- mane in principle, was considered by most of the persons present as chimerical and visionary. The Society, however, amidst many difficulties and consi- derable discouragement, and a perpetual harass by the offer of impracticable schemes from every quarter, nevertheless persevered in their meetings, and suc- ceeded in establishing a communication and corre- spondence with other Societies in different parts of the kingdom. It was in consequence of a private communication I from Dr. Gray to his friend Sir Humphrey Davy, that the latter was first led to apply his profound chemical knowledge to an investigation of the nature of the inflammable gas of the coal mines, and also to a discovery of the best means for preventing the occurrence of accidents from this fire damp,'' as it was called. In August 1815, Davy visited New- castle-upon-Tyne, where he had an interview with

f

/

Composition Of Fire-Damp. 271

Mr. Buddie, one of the most intelligent coal viewers in the north, and who supplied the philosopher, on his return to London, with various specimens of natural gases collected in the colliery workings, for experi- ment. Sir Humphrey not only exercised his wonted scientific acumen, in examining the gases, but en- tered with all his heart into the subject ; declaring, in one of his letters, that he never received so much pleasure from the result of any of his chemical la hours ; for I trust," adds he, that the cause of hu- manity will gain something by it.'*

llie fire-damp," says he, in a confidential com- munication, dated October 30, I find, by chemical analysis, to be (as it has been always supposed) a hydro-carbonate. It is a chemical combination of hydrogen gas and carbon, in the proportion of four by weight of hydrogen gas, and 11 of charcoal. I find it will not explode, if mixed with less than six times, or more than fourteen times its volume of at-

The generationy latency, and eyolatian of this dreadM agent have given rite to much curious enquiry, though hitherto with only very partial suc- cess. Mr. Button, in a paper containing Ohservations on Coal," read before the Geological Society in January 1833, and tending to confirm the importance of those microscopical investigations into the oiganic structure of this and other fossils, so beautifully carried out by Mr. Witham, ingeni- ously shews the probability of the gas existing within the coal in so com- prened a state as to be liquid. Several circumstances induced Mr. Hutton, while engaged in his microscopic enquiries, to search for a structure in coal capable of containing gas ; and he accordingly discovered a system of cells, different ftom any before noticed, and apparently adapted for that purpose. These supposed gas-ceUs are found empty, are generally of a droular form, occur in groups, which communicate with each other, and each cavity has in its centre a small pellet of carbonaceous matter. The author establishes a clear distinction between these cells and others which he describes as filled with bituminous matter; for the anthracite of South Wales contains the fonner, but is quite firee from the latter. He also states, on the authority of Mr. F. Foster, that the anthradte of South Wales affords a free disen- gagement of infiammable gas, when first exposed to the air. — PA/. ilfo. Af. 1833. f. 303.

272 Tfifi SAFETY LAMP.

mospheric air. Air, when rendered impure by the combustion of a candle, but in which the candle will gtill bum, wUl not explode the gas from the mines; and when a lamp or candle is made to bum in a close yessel, having apertures only above and below an explosive mixture of gas admitted merely enlarges the light, and then gradually extinghes it without explosion. Again,— the gas mixed in any proper- tion with common air, I have discovered, wUl not explode in a small tube, the diameter of which is less than the ith of an inch, or even a larger tube, if there is a mechanical force urging the gas through the tube. Explosive mixtures of this gas with air require much stronger heat for their explosion than mixtures of common inflammable gas. Red-hot charcoal, made so as not to flame, if blown up by a mxtai of the mine gas and conmiou air, doL L explode it, but gives light in it : and iron, to cause the explosion of mixtures of this gas wi& air, must be made white-hot. The discovery of these curious and unexpected properties of the gas, leads to several practical methods of lighting the mines without any danger of explosion.'* Sir Humphrey then describes four lamps variously constructed, but respectively depending in the main upon the following principles : First, a certain mixture of azote and carbonic acid prevents the explosion of the fire-damp, and this mixture is necessarily formed in the safe lantern ; — r secondly, the fire-damp will not explode in tubes or feeders of a certain small diameter. The ingress into, and egress of air from my lantern, is through such tubes or feeders ; and, therefore, when an ex- plosion is artificially made in the safe lantern, it does not communicate to the external air/'

Wire-Gauze Guar0. 273

On the ninth of November, the views he enter- tained relative to the composition of fire-damp, and the methods proposed for encountering it with im- punity, were laid before the Rojal Society, in a pap entitled On the Fire-damp of Coal Mines, and on methods of lighting the mine, so as to prevent its explosion/* Dr. Paris details in a very lucid man- ner the progress of the enquiry, so far as regards the mechanical intervention of small tubes, fine circular orifices, or lastly wire-gauze between the lighted candle or lamp, and the explosive atmosphere of the mine, and in the scientific application of which the safety lamp directly resulted. From the issues of these researches it became at once evident, that to light mines invested with fire-damp, with perfect security, it was only necessary to use a well closed lantern, supplied with air from tubes of small diame- ter, through which explosions cannot pass, and with a chimney, on a similar principle, at the upper part, to carry off the foul air. A common lantern, to be adapted to the purpose, merely required to be made air-tight in the door and sides, and to be furnished with the chimney, and the system of safety apertures below and above the flame of the lamp. Such, in &ct, was Davy's fiirst safety lamp ; and having after- wards varied the arrangement of the tubes in different ways, he, at length, exchanged them for canals, which consisted of close concentric hollow metallic cylinders of different diameters, so placed together as to form drcular canals of the diameter of from one twenty-fidfth to one fortieth of an inch ; and of an inch and seven-tenths in length ; by which air is admitted in much larger quantities thsm by the small tubes, and they are, moreover, much superior to the latter

T

2T4 The Safety Lamp.

in practical application. He also found that longi- tudinal air canals ef metal migbt be employed with the same security as the circular canals ; and that a few pieces of tin plate, soldered together, with wires to regulate the diameter of the canal, answered the purpose of the feeder or safe chimney, as well as drawn cyUnders of brass.

On New Year*s Day, 1816, Sir Humphrey Davy, writing to Dr. Gray, says, " I have made very simple and economical lanterns, and candle guards, which are not only absolutely safe, but which give light by means of the fire-damp, and which, while they disarm this destructive agent, make it useful to the miner.'* EEis original lamp with tubes or canals, as already described, was perfectly safe in the most explosive atmosphere, but its light was necessarily extinguished by it; whereas in the wire-gauze cage, ultimately adopted, and now in universal use, the firedamp itself continues to bum, and thus to afford to the miner a useful light, while he is secured from or fore-> warned of the effects of explosion. All that is quired for his guidance and protection in the darkness of the mine, is that the candles or lamps in use, be surrounded by small wire cages ; these at once supply air to the flame, and light to the miner y being at the same time, perfectly safe. In Paris's work before mentioned, may be seen a sketch of the wire gauze instrument, in its first and simplest form. The original lamp is preserved in the laboratory of the Royal Institution. Davy found that iron gauze com posed of wires from one fortieth to one sixtieth of an inch in diameter, and containing twenty-eight wires, or seven hundred and eighty-four apertures to the inch, was safe under all circumstances in atmospheres

Figure And Desceiption. 275

of this kind ; and he oonsequeiitlj onployed that ma- traial in goardin lani for the coal mines, where, in January, 1816, they were immediately adopted. The annexed cut, (fig. 3fi._) represents the lamp Rg. 38. which is in present use. a is a cy-

Under of wire-gauze, with a douUe

!top, securely and carefully fastened, by doubling orer, to the brass rim B, which screws on the lanq> vessel c. Tbe whole is protected and strength- ened by strong iron-wire supports* rivetted into a piece at d, The lan- tern is carried or suspended by the ring attached to the flap E, which admits of beiqg turned aside on its hinge, as shewn in ibe cut, in order

that the gauze cap p, which is slipped on to guard against the chance of the top being buirnt through, may be easily taken off and examined by the workmen every night. In some collieries tliis cover is kept locked during tlie piod of using the lamp, to avoid any risk from those dangerous temptations to remove it which have occa- aioually led to explosions, o the tube where oil is sup- plied. It may be mentioned too, that in order to ob- viate the risque fonnerly incun-ed by the temptation to unscrew the cage off in order to trim the wick of Ae lamp, this end is provided for by means of a wire trimmer, which passes through the part containing the oil, and operates in the slit of the burner*.

One Blroiig objection TcnDerly sxIsUdj In lbs miDdioTlbecoUiOTB against tbe oae of the wfct; lamp, wai fti feeble llhuntnkting powei m oow|Ntred wtUi lulled lampa or undlei. ScbeoM tune bean propoMd to nmvAj Ihii deTeet, but with little buccbh; unong other meuii, reflecton luro bean ffild. TliU conCriTance maj be naelbl, In certain caM*, bat It dbes not poiieai anffident dranCagei to recommend it general adaptalian. T 2

lS7d tHE SAFETY LAMP.

It would hardly comport with the design — cer- tainly not with the limitd of the present work to go into any examination of the evidence adduced in iavour of various claimants to the invention of lamps or lanteins apparently analagous to or widely dif- ferent from that of Davy : Dr. Paris has ably set forth and zealously defended the preeminent claims of his Mend. It is due however, to Mr. G. Ste- phenson> to record that a purse of one hundred guineas was presented to him by a number of gen- tlemen connected with the Coal Trade of Newcastle, in acknowledgment of the ingenuity displayed by hun in the construction of a safely lamp.

In March, 1816, the thanks of a general meeting of proprietors of coal mines, held in Newcastle, were presented to Sir H. Davy This public compliment was immediately followed by a project for presenting to the individual who had done sUch service to hu- manity, some more solid testimonial of respect on the part of the public and the coal owners* Meanwhile, the security-principle of the lamp was put to the most satisfactory test. Mr. Buddie stated that twelve dozens of them were used in Wallsend colliery, and that not an inch of human skin had been lost by fire, since their introduction.

On the 13th of September, 1817, Sir Humphrey Davy being expected to pass through Newcastle on his return from Scotland, preparations were made for and notice given of a dinner, which it was proposed should take place on the 25th instant, for the pur*- pose of presenting to the illustrious philosopher an elegant service of plate which had been prqyaired for his acceptance. Upon this gratifying occasion, a very large party assembled at the Queen's Head

Presentation Of Plate. 277

concdstmg of a numerous and respectable body of coal owners and such other gentlemen as had inte- rested themselves during the progress of the investi gation or taki an active part in promoting the in* troduction of the lamp into the mines.

After the dinner had concluded, and certain toasts of form had been drank Mr. Iiambton, (now Lord Durham) who filled the chair on that occaaion, rose, and on presenting the service of plate to the illus trious guest, addressed him in a tone of great ani* mation and feeling, in nearly the following terms ; — "Sir Humphrey, — It now becomes my duty to fulfil the object of the meeting, in presenting to you this service of plate, from the Coalowners of the Tyne and Wear, as a testimony of their gratitude for the services you have rendered to them and to hu manity. Your brilliant genius, which has been so long employed in an unparalleled manner, in ex tending the boundaries of chemical knowledge, never accomplished a higher object, nor obtained a nobler triumph. You had to contend with an dement of destruction which seemed uncontrollable by human power which not only rendered the property of the Coal-owner insecure, but kept him in perpetual alarm for the safety of the intrepid miner in his service, and often exhibited to him the most appalling scenes of death and heart sickening misery. You have in- creased die value of an important branch of produc- tive industry ; and, what is of infinitely greater im- portance, you have contributed to the preservation of the lives and persons of multitudes of your fellow- creatures. It is now nearly two years that your safety lamp has been used by hundreds of miners in the most dangerous recesses of the earth, and under

278 The Safety Lamp.

the most trying circumstances. Not a single failure has occurred — its absolute security is demonstrated. I hare, indeed, deeply to lament more than one catas- trophe, produced by fooUhardiness and ignorance, in neglecting to use the safeguard you have supplied ; but these dreadful accidents even, if possible, exalt its importance. If your fame had needed any thing to make it immortal, this discovery alone would have carried it down to future ages, and connected it with benefits and blessings. Receive, Sir Humphrey, this permanent memorial of our profound respect and high admiration — a testimony, we trust, equally honourable to you and to us. Long may you live to use it — long may you live to pursue your splendid career of scientific discovery, and to give new claims to the gratitude and praise of the world

Sir Humphrey having received the plate, replied as follows : — " Gentlemen, — I feel it impossible to reply, in an appropriate manner, to the very eloquent and flattering address of your distinguished Chair- man. Eloquence, or even accuracy of language, is incompatible with strong feeling ; and on an occasion like the present, you will give me credit for no small degree of emotion. I have been informed that my labours have been useful to an important branch human industry connected with our arts, our manu factures, commerce and national wealth. To learn this from such practical authority is the highest gratification to a person whose ardent desire has always been to apply science to purposes of utility,

In the year 1825, Sir Hampbrey had the hononr to leceiTe fVom the Emperor Alexander of Bnsalay and, in oompliment of this invention, a aoperb ailyer gilt vaie, rtanding on a dicular tray enriched with medalliona. Oa the ooTer was a figure, of about sixteen or eighteen inches in height, representing the God of Fire, weeping orer his eztingnished torch.— Poft*.

Speech Of Sir H. Davy. 279

It has beeu also stated that the invention which you are this day so highly honouring, has been subser* vient to the preservation of the lives and persons of a most useful and laborious class of men: this, coming from your own knowledge, founded upon such ample experience, affords me a pleasure still more exalted — for the highest ambition of my life has been to deserve the name of a friend to humanity. To crown all, you have, as it were, embodied these sentiments in a permanent and magnificent memorial of your good opinion. I can make only imperfect and inadequate efforts to thank you. Under all cir* cumstances of my future life, the recollection of this day will warm my heart ; and this noble expression of your kindness will awaken my gratitude to the latest moment of my existence." Sir Humphrey having sat down, and the cheering of the company subsided, the Chairman proposed the health of the illustrious chemist in three times three. To this Sir Humphrey returned thanks in an eloquent speech, including an eulogy on the benefits of scientific invention: adducing among other illustrations, the fact that science alone has made pit coal such an im- portant instrument in the hands of the chemiist and mechanic ; it has made the elements of fire and water perform operations which formerly demanded human labour, and it has converted the productions of the earth into a thousand new forms of use and beauty. After drinking to the health and happiness of the company, the worthy Baronet proposed as a senti- ment, " Prosperity to the Coal Trade." The healths of the Duke of Northumberland, the Bishop of Dur- ham, and the Reverend Dr. Grey, were drank in succession, after which Sir Humphrey, accompanied

280 The Safety Lamp.

by the Chairman, retired amidst the enthumastie plaudits of the meeting.

In August, 1831, pending th publication of the life of Davy, Dr. Paris wrote to Newcastle to obtain the latest intelligence relative to the use and advan- tages of the safety lamp. To one of these letters of enquiry, addressed through Sir Cuthbert Sharp, Mr. Buddie replies, " If the Davy lamp was exclusivdy used, and due eare taken in its mansement, it is certain that few accidents would occur in our coal mines ; but the exclusive use of the Davy' is not compatible with the working of many of our mines, in consequence of their not being workable without the aid of gunpowder. In such mines, where every collier must necessarily fire, on the average two shots ay, we are exposed to the risk of explosion from the ignition of the gunpowder, even if no naked lights were used in carrying on the ordinary operations of the mine. This was the case in Jairow Colliery, at the time the late accident happened. As the use of gunpowder was indispensable, naked lights were generally used, and the accident was occasioned by a boff' of inflammable air forcing out a large block of coal, in the face of a drift, from a fissure in which it had been pent up perhaps from the Creation, and firing at the first naked light with which it came in contact, after having been diluted down to the com- bustible point by a due admisture of atmospheric air. As to the number of old collieries and old workings which have been renovated, and as to tiie quantity of coal which has been, and will be saved to the public

Davy was also highly gratified and affected, while in the North, by a trtitten address which he received from the working colliers, thanking him on behalf of themselves and their families, for the preservation of their Utss.

Efficiency Of The "Davy. 281

by the inventioii of the Davy, it is scarcely possible to give an account, or to iorm an estimate. In this part of the country/- continues Mr. Buddie, '' Walker's Colliery, after having been completely worked out, accordhig to the former system, with candles and BteeUmills, and after having been abandoned in 181 1, was re-opened in 1818 by the aid of the Davy,* and has been worked on an extensive scale ever since, and may continue to be worked for an almost inde finite period. Great part of the formerly relin- quished workings of Wallsend, WiUington, Percy- Main, Hebbum, Jarrow, Elswick, Benwell, &c. &c. as well as several collieries on the Wear, have been recovered, and are continued in work by the inter- vention of the Davy.' "

The following is a commumcation to the same effect from Mr. Fenwick, a gentleman of much prac- tical ability : it affords, as Dr. Paris justly remarks, additional evidence of the utility of the lamp : — Sir Humphrey Davy's safety-lamp has afforded much security in the general working of mines, particularly by ensiling the Coal-owner to work, in several situa- tions, the pillars of coal formerly left therein, which, under the system of working by candles, or open flame, was deemed hazardous and impracticable; and, in consequence, one-sixth part more of coal, may be estimated as obtainable from those mines whidi are subject to hydrogen gas. Also in the working

The opportune improvement and application of the steam engine for drawing the water oat of mlnef already heooming too deep to be dndned by the ordiiuury hydraulic machiBee, liaa already been adverted to; and it is a fact no less worthy of notice, that the invention of the safety lamp took plaee at a time when the steam engine was perfect in its appUcatlcm to cdUerleSy whilst the dificolties and dangers attendant upon getting the deep coaly appeared in many places to indicate the limit ot justifiable pro< gross in connection with any mode of ventilation then known.

282 The Safety Lamp.

of the pillars of coal (commonly called the second working), great advantages and securities as well as a saving of expences, have resulted from the use of this lamp, not only to the lessees of collieries, inas much as more coal is obtained from a given space than before, (particularly in collieries subject to fire* damp,) but also to the lessor of such mines, by their being more productive, and of course, more durable than heretofore. Another advantage results from the use of this safety lamp, and in the working of the pillars in particular. It is found now, through expe* lience, that the changeable state of the atmosphere, which our barometers daily indicate, has a most powerful effect on the noxious air in mines ; as, from a sudden change in the atmosphere, indicated by the rapid fall of the mercury in the barometrical tube, a rapid discharge of noxious gas into the workings and excavations of the mine is the consequence, caused by the want of atmospheric equilibrium : in which case the mine becomes suddenly surchaiged with hydrogen, and if worked by the light of open Jlame, an explosion may take place before the possibility of such a circumstance can even be suspected; but if worked by the safely-lamp, it is only shewn by the gas in the lamp becoming a pillar of harmless fire. This circumstance frequently takes place when any atmospheric change causes the mercury in the baro- meter to sink to twenty*ight inches and a half, or thereabouts/'

In March, 1834, a petition was presented to the House of Commons by Mr. Littleton, M.P. for Staf- fordshire, on behalf of the Coal Masters and Miners of the Staffordshire Collieries, and of the Collieries in the neighbourhood of Dudley,'' praying "that

Petition To Parliament. 283

some legislative measure may be provided, appointing a Scientific Board to examine all lamps intended to be offered for sale to tiie public as safety lamps to be used in collieries, and to direct tiie stamping all such as they shall approve, and to prohibit the sale of any as safety lamps, which shall not be so approved ; and also to examine a safeguard to enable workmen, when necessary, to enter places infected with mephitio gases/' The petitioners, to shew that their appro* hensions of the jeopardy in which tiiey stand are not groundless, submit to Parliament tiie consideration tiiat, within the preceding eight months, more than one hundred industrious men have been deprived of life, or greatiy injured in tiieir persons, by explosions of inflammable air in coal pits, viz. : — On the dth of May preceding, forty-seven persons were destroyed, any many severely wounded, by an explosion at Springwell Colliery, near Newcastle ; on the 1st of September, in Oldbury, near Dudley, thirteen were greatly injured, of whom three are since dead ; and near the end of the same month, at Mr. Kirwen's Colliery near Workington, fourteen men were killed and several severely hurt ; besides several minor ac- cidents attended with death, within that short period. Throughout this prolix document, the name of Davy does not once occur; and, what is still more re- markable, it is no where asserted in this petition, or in any of the accounts of the catastrophies published, that the safety-lamp devised by that individual was, although constantiy used, the cause of a single ex-

A Committee of the HooBe of Commons, appointed to enquire into the caoMB and pretention of aoddenta in coal minee, hed been aiiUng some Ume when the accident at Wallaend, mentioned in the preceding Chapter, occurred to quicken attention to the sulgect. Numerooft witnesies have bee9 examined, but as yet, (July 29, 1835), no report has been printed.

fi84 THE SAFETY LAMP.

ploaon. This, however, seems to be intimated, for in order apparently to meet the anticipated allegation of Btigent nsage of the instrament, the petitioners rnark that, many fisttal accidents have been attri- bnted to the carelessness of the woikmen in the use of their lamps ; but we humblj submit,'' thej add, to the sense of this enlightened assembly that this charge should not be received unless supported by strong evidence ;" this is certainly right and proper enough ; but when they proceed thus : — For it is contrary to the natural principle of self-preservation tliat men' should, where the dreadful consequences are well knovni, be thus indifferent to their own safety," they assert what is undoubtedly true, as a general principle— but how stands the fact? why, that tlie workmen have been negligent in the manie- ment of their lamps, and explosions, consequently, have occurred. It is, indeed, highly probable, (and evidence to the contrary might easily and would promptly be adduced did it exist,) that there has been no instance of an explosion* occurring in conse- quence of the use of the Davy lamp where it has been properly used; i. e. neither inadvertently opened,

It has, indeed, been alledged, and with some reason perhaps, that the very tacnrity of the Pavy lamp, haa tended to increase the nomber of ac- cidents, by leading to an nnreasonable reliance on its soffideney in the most dangerous workings, apart Irom ventilation — attention to improvements in the latter important object, having by no means kept pace with the sanguine deaiTCS of those persons who think the lamp ought not to be used as a woiking light at all, but merely ior special purposes. It seems, however, justly doubtful whether any mode of ventilation sofficien perfect to render a guarded Ugbt unnecessscy, could be devised, even if Oovemment, or the coal owners themselves, were to offer a lazge premium for a satlsfisctoiy plan. ' Undoubtedly the expensiveaess of attempting or maintaining a complicated system of ventilation at profound depths, affcvds a ready apology for trealiBg with less complaoeooy presets of trial-schemes on that side, tiian for en* conraging experiment! in the more economical afiUr of noaexplotive IQu- mination,

Sources Of Danger. 285

the meshes of the wire disturbed, so as to widen some of the apertures, nor the tissue too long kept at a red heat. It has been urged as conclusive against Sir H. Davy's theoij of the cooling effect of wire gauze, that not only is it permeable to so much of the flame of a spirit lamp, that the latter may be ignited by a taper, and will continue to bum on the upper side of the tissue over which it is applied, but that the miners sometimes actually work with the cage at a red heat for hours together! Whatever becomes of the cooling theory,'' the act of deq[>erat& temerity, just alluded to, undoubtedly exposes the miner to two sources of fatality : for, although the carburetted hy- drogen will not of itself explode merely by being in contact with the incandescent wire, yet coal dust flying against it may readily become ignited and an explosion thus ensue. Moreover, although hy- drogen, simply in its condition of a carburet, will not ignite from contact with red hot metal, yet sulphu- retted hydrogen becomes, under such circumstances, exceedingly explosive; and as it is freely evolved wherever martial pyrites are exposed to the action of moisture, the combination of the two gases, unsus- pected it may be, notwithstanding the strong smell of the latter, when in excess, is, no doubt, much more frequently than mtty be supposed, the cause of explo- sions in certain mines.

Chapter Xv-

The Colliers.

Pitmen possess distinct Characteristics — Working in the Mines an ancient penal employment — Intelli- gence of Cottiers y and Individwds rvho have risen into notice from among them — Morals y Recreations and Tastes — Wages — Dwellings and Habits of the Pitmen about Newcastle — Denominations of Over- seers and Workmen — Undertakers of Coal Pits in Staffordshire — The Colliers — Instance of tlmr mode of exciting Cluirity — Misunderstandings be tween the Tyne Pitmen and their Masters — Com binatiofts — A " Stick or Strike-Injurious conse- quences of the Disputes — Murder of a Magistrate — Gibbet on Jarrow Slake.

xIAVING described the dangers which beset the colliers, and the accidents to which they are more particularly liable while pursuing their underground labours, as well as the contrivances that have been devised for mitigating the most fearful and frequent of those accidents, it may not be here out of place, to introduce a few succinct notices of the more promi- nent characteristics of a class of men to whose labours we ai'e daily indebted in such a variety of ways.

Traits Of Character*

The colliers, or pitmen as they are more commonly called in the north, are, or, perhaps, to speak more accurately — they werey a class hardly less distinct in character and habits from the rest of the commimity, than sailors themselves it is true, the element upon which the seaman liyes, the perils to which' he is inured, and the peculiar discipline of the naval ser-* vice, have nothing in common with the depth, the darkness, nor the dangerous operations of the mine But still, the latter cimmerian region usually differs so much from the scene of man's ordinary daylight avocations above ground, as often to impress very distinct traits upon those who are wholly brought up therein. These remarks, however, as above inti- mated, will apply with much greater force to the cir- cumstances of past times, — the present race of colliers having, in common with even sailors themselves, been exposed to the assimilating effects of the '' march of intellect,"' and happily, too, in many instances, to the still more important influence of moral improve-

Among the ancients, and in some despotic states at the present time, subterranean mineral operations, have been chiefly carried on by criminals or captives; and in hot climates amidst certain descriptions of strata, the occupation is noisome and destructive to the last degree. Moralists, indeed, have regarded

This tiioiluity, the writer finds has been noticed by the Rot. L. Booker, Vicar of Dudley, who in September, 1816, a period of great depression in the Staifordshire coUieries, pnblished in the Times" newspaper, a moral Bong, entitled The CoDiers Petition," intended to aid those who were com. polled to beg aboat the country. After aUnding to the Tarious imposters who duped the charitably disposed in the guise of pitmen, the Rer. writer says, The natlTe collier of the district is a diiTerent character— generous and honest hearted, he possesses many features of mind resembling those of the British sulor."— 7 jms, Sfpi, 4, 1816.

388 The Colliers.

the danger and the difficulty of extracting the various matters laid up in the bowels of the earthy as among the most striking proofs that man is in a state of penal subjection to the consequences of the first offence. Is it conceivable/' enquires the Rev. T. Gisbome,* that'men, innocent, happy in the full enjoyment of the paternal favour of God, — men dwelling in an actual or virtual paradise, should be doomed by their heavenly Father to seek the mineral productions, which we are supposing them to need in such a situa- tion, and to ld that in such a state ? Is it conceivable that they should be appointed to delve in subterranean darkness amidst water and mire, amidst the crash of felling caverns, the suffocations of mephitic air, and the explosions of fire-damps ? Is it conceivable that, like the criminals of andent Rome, or the enslaved Indiaxis of Spanish America, they should be thus 'damnati ad metalla* — condemned to the mines ?f Assuredly we may conclude," adds our author, that, if to innocent and favoured man minerals were of importance, they would be provided for him by Divine goodness in stations eas of detection and of access, and would be endued with the qualities neces- sary for his purpose."

hardy — if not an athletic race : indeed the late Dr. Brownrigg, of Whitehaven, has pronounced 'the various occupations of the coal miner to be at once a

profitable and even a healthy employmit."

Taitimoiij ci Natnna Theology, f. 17.

f It is Mid tibat in aaolent ihom, the Sooteli coUien had so Uttle reliak for their employmefnt, and were, at the same tinwi in such a eervUs oondi- that they vera ehained to tbe pita, In such case, they would Uterally be llie *'swarty slaves," of whom Jago speaks, in his poem of EdgehiU the appellation, however, doos not apply to any class of pitmen, at this day, in Great Britain.

Eminent Men. 289

The Cornish tninei*s have often been referred to as being a remarkably observant and intelligent race of men: combining, as they commonly do, each in his own person, the labourer, the adventurer, and the merchant, they have acquired a degree of shrewd- ness and industry that could not fail to be noted, especially by strangers with whom they came into contact The colliers, on the other hand, whether less knowing or not, have been in this respect at least, less known : they have almost uniformly been the servants of capitalists between whom and the ac- tual labourers there have existed several gradations of rank — so to speak — the duties of the uppermost of which, however, bear very lightly, if at all on the real independence of the lowest — the latter indeed frequently rising meritoriously from the bottom to the top of the scale. Many honourable instances of this'' might be mentioned. It is no proof of the ge Aeral intelligence of any body of operatives, that men of talent have occasionally risen from among them to distinguished stations in society ; but it is natural to associate the ultimate fame or notoriety of an indivi- dual with his original calling, and this, without the least disparagement or disrespect. It is on this prin- ciple that one feels a certain description of interest in knowing that the late celebrated Doctor Hutton was originally a hewer employed in Old Long Benton ColUeiy ; that Mr. Stephenson, the intelli- gent engineer of the Liverpool and Manchester Rail- way, was originally a coal miner ; that the late Rev. W. Huntingdon, an eccentric but talented preachet in the Metropolis, was a coal-heaver ; and even that the late king of the conjurers" as the ingenious In- gelby was called, was a pitman, who first practised

u

290 The Colliers.

ftlight of hand among his companions on the banks of the Tjne. Thomas Bewick too, the celebrated xylographer and illustrator of nature/' may be men- tioned as another instance* His father was a collier in the neighbourhood of Hexham ; and Thomas with his brothers — one of whom died, after giving promisQ of high excellency in the beautiful art of wood graving — was early immured in that subterranean, laborious, and loathsome employment. I have heard him say," rnarks his friend Mr. Dovaston, that the remotest recollection of his powerful and tenacious memory was that of lying for hours on his side be tween dismal strata of coal, by a glimmering and dirty candle, plying the pick with his little hands — those hands afterwards destined to elevate the arts, illus trate nature, and promulgate her truths, to the de- light and instruction of the moral and intellectual world."

At a period when the nation generally was in a state of apparent apathy as regarded the doctrines and duties of our holy religion, it was not to be ex- pected that

The few — faithful among the faithless found/'

would be colliers : indeed it should not have been surprising to any one that among men so circum- stanced, morality, or at all events piety, was at the lowest ebb. Such was the fact : and those persons only who are acquainted with the labours of the late Rev. John Wesley and his zealous coadjutors, in preaching at the risk of their lives among llie colliers of Kingswood and elsewhere, can have any just no- tion of the state of ignorance and brutality which prevailed. Their sports and pastimes were mostly of

Mag. Nat Hist, ii., 313.

Piety, Intelligence, And Wages. 291

that barbarous description of which happily few traces at present remain, such as bulUbaiting, cock-fighting, boxing, &c. On the other hand, a taste for music largely prevailed, there being found among the pit- men not only those who could play upon the more common instruments, but in some of the hamlets en- tire bands were made up. It may be added that some of these grimy men are considerable readers of works not always found in the hands of workmen, such as metaphysical treatises, &c. On religious subjects, many of them are exceedingly well informed; and instances of remarkable piety have repeatedly been furnished by the pitmen. The wages of the collier differ, of course, according to circumstances ; being in general, however, paid according to the number of chaldrons sent to bank. When hiring was common, the master stipulated that the hewet should be allowed to earn 14s. or 15s. per week on the average, whether the works went on or not : the men could, however, sometimes earn Os. or 7s. a day, though this was rarely the case for any length of time, except under peculiar circumstances. The wages are paid once a fortnight on the Friday, the intervals being designated as Baffy and Pay week. In general, the perquisite of having coals found for

There is, indeed, no class of persons, sailors themselves not excepted, who hare greater reason to li?e in constant readiness to encounter sudden death, than the colliers who worli In some of our deep and impure mines. The following is a striking illustration of the prevalence of pious sentiments under circumstances of excruciating trial : — In one of the Newcastle collieries, thirty-five men and forty-one boys died by suffocation, or were starred to death; one of the boys was found dead with a Bible by his side, and a tin box such as colliers use ; within the lid he had contrived to engrave with the pdnt of a nail this last message to his parent and brother : Fret not, my dear Mother, for we are singing the praises of God while we have time. Mother, follow God, more than ever I did. Joseph, think of God, and be kind to poor Mother."

u2

if

292 The Colliers.

their own me, is included in agreements with the master. Commonly the quantity is so many loads or tons in the year ; sometimes as much as an indi- vidual can carry away at certain intervals.

The pitmen in the north of England reside much less commonly in the towns or Tillages than in clus- ters of small houses adjacent to the respective col- lieriesy and forming together litde colonies, often more remarkable for the amount of the population, than the neatness or cleanness of their domestic ar- rangpements : the latter circumstance is frequently attributable less to the absence of good housewifely than to other obvious causes. On the other hand, it is but justice to remark, that many of the houses of the colliers are patterns of cleanliness. Most of the old pitmen had a taste for expensive funutare-*a taste still indulged by many ; and it would be impos- sible for a stranger to pass in front of the lowly dwel* Hnga, three or four hundred in number, adjacent to Jarrow colliery, for example, without being struck by the succession of carved mahogany bedposts, and tall chests of drawers, as weU as chairs of the same costly material, which are presented at almost every open door : it is affirmed, indeed, that some of these mean looking habitations do not contain a single article in wood of any other kind. These congre- gated dwellings are the property of the owners, or lessees o( the coal, and as the occupants pay no

The maimer in wUch the wires of ilie Lancaahlre cdllien, aie some'

times seen straggling with large ooals, shews at once that they are paid on

the same principle with Donald Ross, the pnbHc exeoationer of Inverness,

who, in 181, was allowed, among other perquisites, to recelTe for fees in

fttel, thirty-fire peats weekly, from the tacksman of the petty customs; a

bushel of coals out of erery cargo of English coals imported into the town,

nd a piece of coal as kargt as Kt could carry out of erery careo of Scotch coals.

HABITATIONS AND TASTES. !29d

rent — or at least, not in a direct manner, tbree-penoe a week being usually set off in the reckoning for house and coals — thej are considered to be removable at pleasure : i. when thej chose to go and work for another master. Removals of this sort, however, were formerly less frequent on the whole, than might be supposed, the pitmen hiring and re-hiring them- selves to their employers for a given time, and re- ceiving, at the same lime, a bounty often amounting to several pounds, and which money, in too many instances, was presently squandered away in gam- bling and intenvperance. In their dress, pitmen, singularly enough, often affect to be gaudy, or ratiier they did so formerly, being fond of clothes of flaring colours. Their holiday waistcoats, caHecl by tbem pasey jackets, were frequently of very curious patterns displaying flowers of various dyes : thdr stockings mostly of blue, purple, pink, or mixed colours. A great part of them used to have their hair veiy long, which on work-days was either tied in a queue, or rolled up in curls ; but when drest iv their best attiret, it was commonly spread over their shouldevs. Sooie of them wore two or three narrow ribbands round tbdr hats, placed at equal distances in which it was eus tomary with them to insert one or more bunches of primroses or other flowers. Perhaps it wiH strike a stranger, on passing along the streets of Newcastle on a Sunday or holiday, that the better sort of the inhabitants are partial to poseys or flowers*

The general direction of a large colfiery, as to the scale and disposition of its workings, and also with regard to whatever requires a profound theoretical, as well as a complete practical, knowledge of obtain- ing the coal economically and safely, is in the North

294 The Colliers.

confided to persons called viewers. The liepver being not only a person of education, but one who is pre- sumed to have the best information and laiest expe- rience as to all matters connected with mining, he is consulted professionally by the coal owners, and in the degree that he is found to possess judgment and integrity, his services are often retained by several independent concerns. Under him is the avermany or person who has the sole direction of the under- ground economy of a pit, visiting it every moriiing before the men go to work, and keeping a daily account of the labours of the pitmen. He takes his instructions from the viewer, and every person else in the pit is subordinate to him. Tlie office of an overman is of the utmost importance in the manage- ment of a coal mine, and none but men of tried ex perience, integrity, and sobriety should be appointed to fill it. An overman is allowed as many deputies as may be necessary, according to circumstances. The keeker is an inspector of the hewers, &c. Hewers are the workmen who are actually employed in cut- ting down the coel in the mine. Putters and barrow- men are employed in filling and putting, or pushing the corves on trams to the crane or shaft. Drivers are boys employed to drive the horses. TVappers are the youngest class of boys employed to close the doors, which duty is sometimes performed by old men. Onsetters, those who hook on and take off the corves below, as the banksman does above.

In the collieries in other parts of the country, although the foregoing terms may not be used, the

Tbe pitman in the North calls his companion marrow; hence the line In the Collier*8 Song—

" As me and my manvw were putting our tram," &c.

Distribution Of Duties. 295

workmen are generally divided into much the same parties, though the supervision of the work may be different. In some parts of Staffordshire, the work- ing of a colliery is undertaken conjointly by two men, provincially termed Butty and Doggey. When a person owning a tract of coal wishes to work it with- out actual personal direction or superintendence, he sends for the parties above named, who contract to get and raise the coal at a royalty of one-fourth, fifth, or sixth of the proceeds of sale, according to agree- ment— the owner " putting down the plant," i. finding the machinery ; so that the undertakers have no property but their labour in the "plantation." The Butty, who is generally the manager of the concern, as representative of the owner, rarely de- scends the shaft, while the Doggey takes the entire and absolute direction of all the underground opera- tions. These co-contractors are often liberally re- munerated, and sometimes amass considerable pro- perty, particularly the former, who are also proverbial for their obesity — Butly and a man with a great belly being terms nearly synonymous among the Staffordshire colliers. When found unsatisBaictoTy, or suspected of dishonesty, they may be " valued out," as it is termed, by a competent reference, the owner in this case paying what may be judged a reasonable bonus to the party displaced. In many instances, however, the coal proprietors manage their collieries as any other concern is managed, namely, through the medium of responsible agents, a ground- bailiff taking the general oversight somewhat in the maimer of a Newcastle viewer.

In 1827, a writer in " Knight's Quarterly Maga- zine" gave a graphic and facetious description of the

296 The Colliers.

Staffordshire colliers as he noticed them about BilstoD Their figures are tall and robust in an ordinaiy degree ; but their faces are pale aud furrowed even at an early age. Their working dress consists of trowsers and tunic of flannel; but their holiday clothes are generally of velveteen, rather profiisely decorated with shining metal buttons: like their Newcastle brethren, they pique themselves on their garters, which are of worsted, very gay in colour,

appears below the knee. In the opinion of the writer alluded to, the high cheek bones, and even the dia- lect of these pitmen, seem to argue them of northern descent. Perhaps, in some remote age, they may have swarmed from the Northumbrian hive, to seize on the riches of — or rather, it ought to be said, to toil amidst the most imminent dangers for the advan* tage of the Southrons. They have— or rather had, for education has innovated upon the custom — among other peculiarities, a [Mractice of designating each other, as well as strangers, by some c(omen de- rived from the most striking personal peculiarity of the individual ; hence such classical appellations as Nosey, Red Face, Bullhead, Pigtail, Spindleshanks, Cowskin, &c. were current among them ; and these not as occasional vulgarisms, but applied with a coa stancy which frequently caused the baptismal and surname entirely to smk in the soubriquet, to the no small inconvenience of persons ccmcemed in ob taining the real name of some individual. Ludicrouii instances of difficulty and mistake have been men- tioned as arising from this practice.

Scarcely, perhaps, less characteristic of the mind and temper of these hardy sons of subterranean toil,

Mode Of Exciting Charity. 297

was the striking manifestation of the co-operative spirit which occurred in 1816 among the Staffordshire colliers. About this time, owing to the continued depression of the coal and iron trades, and consequent discharge of workmen, a number of colliers deter- mined amongst themselves to make their case known to Government, and adopted the novel mode of yoking themselves to several waggons laden with coal, hav- ing previously drawn up a petition signed by several Magistrates, which they intended to present to the Prince Regent, together with the coal. Accordiny, three teams of this description set out for the metro- polis, each waggon having about fifty men yoked to it ; whilst others took different directions. One of the waggons proceeded by the route of Worcester another by Coventry and Birmingham, and the third by Stourbridge. They proceeded at the rate of about twelve miles a day, and received voluntary gifts of money, &c. on the road as they passed along, decli* ning to ask alms : their motto, as placarded on their vehicles being — Rather work thAn beg." To pre- vent their progress to the metropolis, police-officers were sent from the Home Department Office, who met two of the parties, one at St. Alban's, and ano- ther near Maidenhead, and told the men that they had adopted wrong means to procure relief, and per* suaded them quiy to return. They were allowed the value of their coals, which were left to be distri- buted to the poor, and sufficient means were given them to reach their homes. The conduct of these distressed men was most exemplary : they listied with the greatest respect and attention to the advice of the Magistrates, and, after obtaining a certificate of their good behaviour, returned with the waggons

208 The Colliers.

to their families and friends. A similar proceeding took place a few miles from Chester the Magis- trates of that city met the third team, dissuaded the men from further persisting in their ill-advised undertaking, and gave them £20 for the coal, with which they were perfectly satisfied, and im- mediately returned to their own neighbourhood. The novelty of this aflfair created some sensation in London.

Of late years, the ancient relations, so long sub- sisting between the pitmen and their employers, have been sadly broken down by the operation of circum- stances over which, as to their origin, perhaps, neither party had much direct controul. According to the old order of things, immemorial usages were tacitly allowed to have the force of law : the men were regu- larly hired, spent their money and their lives, with little consideration of what the world was doing around themt sometimes they acted despotically; but their masters grew rich : and this harmony was only broken by occasional riots resulting from acci- dental causes. The old proverb, setting forth the folly of "carrying coals to Newcastie," was duly reverenced ; and the practicability of carrying them from various other places to London and elsewhere, appeared to excite but littie attention. But when the spirit of mercantile speculation was once turned toward the collieries, and new sources of supply were opened up ; when competition arose in the market, and the consequent diminution of individual profits, induced the masters to aim at making better terms with the men, the latter sought to strengthen them- selves by the dangerous bond of combination ; ac-

Pill's Topography Staff. 179.

Associations Of Pitmen. 209

cordiiigly unions of the pitmen were formed, and from that moment, a series of conflicts, too painful to

In 1896 Che Association of ColUen on the riyenTyne and Wear' con- Bisied of upwards of foar thousand persons. The ostensible objects of their Union were to make proTision for themselyes and families in cases of death, sickness, or other accidents or infirmities, and to unite in a firm man- ner, in order to obtain a more suitable reoompence for and to regulate the hours of labour." One clanae in the Rules of this Union provided that no member should earn more than four shillings and rixpenoe per daj, while employed underground in the mines nor is any one allowed to work as a hewer, in shiftwork, aboTC eight hours in eveiy twenty-four hours;" nor, when hired by the day, should he labour underground aboTe twelve hours in the twenty-four.

On the other hand, the coal owners of the above districts had also formed themselTes into an Union, and required, coUectiTcly, a bond, which had for a long period preceding the abore date, been customarily signed by the workmen at the time of their annual hiring in the month of March. Many of the clauses of this bond, as well as the method of its promulgation, were held to be serious grierances by the pitmen. It was the custom, instead of giving each man a copy of the document, to read it aloud in the open air, from some eminence, at the time and place of hiring, immediately after which, the parties were called upon to sign the contract — though in conse- quence of the sounds of disapprobation frequently expressed by the nearer portion of the audience, on the reading of new and unpalatable clauses, those at the outside sometimes could not hear at aU. Instead of this readings they wished to be fiimished with copies of the bond a fortnight before the time of hiring.

Their objections in detail had reference to the time of lying idle, the amount and method of collecting forfeits for sending up short measure, or mixing the coal, and some other matters. In order to ascertain that the corves are properly filled, it is stipulated that a tub of the standard measure of the corves to be used at each colliery shall be kept at the mouth of the pit, for the purpose of measuring the contents of any suspected oorve which may be sent to bank, and if It shall be found deficient in quantity, no payment is made for hewing and filling the same. This is sometimes a hard case; for the poor pitman, who happens to have sent his corves away At>m the board unintentionally half-a-peck defective, or from which that quantity may acci- dentally be scattered, in its passage to the bank, loses the price of getting the remainder, 39 pecks, as, notwithstanding the next corve might contain a peck over, it would not be allowed to go to make up the deficiency.

It is alM> provided by the bond, that In case any foul coal, splint, or stone, shall be found in any corf, to the amount of one quart, or more, the hewer shall forfdt three-pence per quart ; and if the whole quantity shall exceed four quarts, the hewer is adjudged guilty of a misdemeanor, and is sulgect to a penalty inflicted by law. Moreover, for every corf of good coals mixed with bottom coals, sent to bank, it is covenanted that the hewer forfeit one shilling for every such corf, and one shilling for every corf of round coals mixed with small coals, and sent to bank. To this rpgulation the pitmen

300 The Colliers.

be dwelt upon, from being in every way disastrous in their consequences, ensued.

As the masters in general no longer felt willing to give the usual bounty or hiring, the men declined to engage themselves, or indeed to work at all, ex- cept on their own terms ; and hence resulted what, in the language of the norths is called a stick/* But, as always happens in contests of this nature, there were on the other hand, some masters anxious to be served at all events, and in some instances, it may be, actuated by other motives — these were ready to liire the pitmen on high terms : again, there were not a few of the pitmen desirous of labouring for the maintenance of themselves and their famiUes, for such wages as they could obtain, or might think snffi* cient, who were prevented by intimidations from so

strongly oled, becanae," m.j Chey, oader the tenm foul eoaif (he master claiies whalBTer parte of the strata he pleases." Thas, If coal be taioM with red mst, in consequence of the damp air penetnting the pores to a certain depth, it is considered of inferior quality, and therefore called fotl eoal there is often constdemble difficulty attendant on a complete separa- tion of IL Wlien it is eflboted to the best of a man's knowledge, should he omit to mark tlie corf that contained the fool coal, or tiie mark bo rubbed off, as someCimes happens, It is set out as Unable. When there are two or three bands in a seam, besides the top and bottom stone, it is sometimes ex- tremely dtfiicnli fo rid the cosl of srery portion of it, especially with no other Ugiit than the ftdnt gleaming of a Uavy lamp. As to the mixture of small and large ooals, the pitmen declare it next to impossible to send a oorf to bank without its being more or less so mixed.

To shew the dexterity with which the colliers can put an extreme case, suppose," say they, a man were to work twenty-five fbrtnigta in a year ton days each, and twelve corres each dey, at 6s. 6d. per score, he would hew 3000 corves, for which, on the separation system, he would hstve to forfeit aecofding to the rigour of the bond, 3000 shillings, or £150!. As the amount of his earnings on the above calculation, would be only £48 Ids. he would consequently, at the end of the year, be indebted to bis master £10) Ss. be- sides the total loss of his wning"— Appeal to Coal Ow9ten and Yiewen, NoweoiiUj 182& The extravagant character of the foregoing hypothecs need not be pointed out: the men, in fkct, but seldom, on the whole, expose themselves to fines on these heads, unless there be gross negligence or the intention of wilful fraod.

Benefit Societies. 301

doing.* Thus it happened that in some of the little colonies above mentioned ejectments of the tenants,

Whether the mtes of remmieFfttiozi at which the pitmen were expected to tell their lahoiir to tlieir employere, wm too little or not, or whether the latter in every instance dealt fairly with the men, the writer does not profess to be competent to decide ; the remarics in the text have merely reference to disasteiB the existence and origin of wliich were but too palpaible. Neither is it intended by any expression of disapprobation towards combinations for OTeimling a free trade in labour, to cast any imputation upon aesodationB finrmedfor the mntnal relief of their members when labouring under sick nessy accidents, or infirmity} the former are essentially mischievous, the latter can hardly become other than beneficial. The coal-owners themselves have always been anxious to promote these Benefit Societies, and connected with the Lamhton Collieries, there is one numbering about twelve hundred members. It was established by the Earl of Durham, in January, 1833, for the maintenance of its members in old age, sickness, lameness, or infirmity. It is supported by voluntary subscription; and his Lordship contributes a sum equivalent to one-sixth part of the ordinary contributions of all the members. The first anniversary of this association was celebrated at Lamh- ton Castle, when the committee of management, fifty in number, were hos- pitably entertained by Lord Durham, who after dinner, addressed the persons present on the subject of combinations. Sad experience (he said) must have shown yoo that combinations effected but one object — that of enabling a certain number of cunning and unprincipled men to live at your expense, whilst you were starving, and, at the same time, ruining the trade of the district, wliich in many cases has been transferred to other parts of the country. The laws of the land were violated, assaults and indecent outrages, nay even murders, were committed, and after perpetuating distubance and confusion for montlis, and levying thousands of pounds from the indostrioof wortmen, what waa the result f Did wages advance f No, the very reverse. Thousands of additional workmen were brought from a distance, and there being many mora hands than could be employed, in the natural course of things, wages were still more lowered. The pretence for these unions has been to raise wages; the real effect had been, not the advance of the rate of wages, but merely the support of those delegates for a limited time in idle- ness and luxury. These men know, or ont to know, that the rate of wages depends on the price which is given by the public for the article worked. Now, the price of coals is very low, so much so, that little or no profit is made by the coalowner. In many instances he actually loses, and pays tilie wages of his men out of his capital, not out of his profits. Be assured that if prices rise, wages rise as a matter of course ; but that if prices ML wagea must also fall, and that it is as impossible for the master to pay his men ad- ▼anoed wages when prioea are low, as it would be for yoa to pay your butcher and grocer higher prices for meat and tea and sugar whilst your wa|pes are low. If any of these delsgates tell you that the coalowner has been making great profits, out of which he could afford you a higher rate of wages, he haa grossly deceived you. In no trade is there less regular profit and moi steady and permanent expense. In fact, capital invested in the coal trade

302 The Colliers.

vj et armis, were going on while in anotlier place personal injuries were dealt oat to the unfortunate indiyidual who might be disposed to resume work without leave of the " Committee/'

The inhabitants of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and those in the inunediate neighbourhood, will not soon forget the stick'' of the pitmen in 1832 ; nor can the latter, as a body, presently recover from the sufferingi they brought upon themselves. All the frightful evils resulting from a misunderstanding of the nature above alluded to; aggravated as they were, by a strongly organised power of resistance on both sides, were almost daily exhibited through a considerable portion of the year. When these men had struck work some time, and there appeared no likelihood of any agree- ment being come to between them and the masters, the latter circulated advertisements in the remote mining districts, inviting workmen to come dovm to the north to take the place of the turn-outs, holding forth at the same time the fairest prospects of good wages and personal protection : the pitmen, in turn, distributed themselves through the country, and sought by every means in their power to counteract the effect of these flattering inducements — and one of their modes of doing this was by the publication of a broad-sheet list of the accidents by fire and flood," which had, at various times, occurred in the collieries on the Tyne ! Notwithstanding this, great numbers

Affords less intefest than almost any other, with more hasaid and uncertainty. At the present moment most coUieiies are conducted at no profit at all, or at a loss; and if this state of things continues, wiD have to be shut up. It is in these cireumstanoes that men are going about endeaToniing to raise unions in order to raise the rate of wages. Their success would entail the shutting up of many collieries, and the consequent spreading over those remaining all the unemployed hands. The result, I need not tell you, would be a still greater reduction of wages."

A Stick Of The Pitmen. 303

of pei'sonS; particularly from Wales, left their houses removed their families, and went to work in the north. The northern coaches were crowded with the adventurers, and the stagewaggons were piled with their bedding and boxes : many from the shorter distances of Staffordshire or Yorkshire, walked or hired light vehicles — and certainly to see the nu- merous haggard pedestrians, or the cart loads of squallid women and children, in and about the town of Newcastle, going and returning, was a grievous sight ! Many of the strangers found matters so little flattering, that they hastily bent their steps back again ; others staid and entered upon their work ; not a few, especially of the Welsh strangers, fell victims to the cholera, which raged sorely at several of the collieries ; in almost all cases, the condition of the new comers was irksome in the extreme. It was no uncommon thing to see the native pitmen idly re- posing on the grass, or unaccountably traversing the neighbourhood, while a policeman with a drawn sword in his hand, or a firelock on his shoulder, was walking to and fro, on the adjacent pit*hill, to protect the party at work within! The police were out every night on duty about the several collieries, to prevent damage to the works or outrage to the men.

It was not to be supposed that in a state of things like this, however discreetly the bulk might act — and certainly the conduct of many was irreproachably peaceful — that all the parties who were so highly ex- cited, would demean themselves in such a manner as not to be overtaken in any direct breach of the law. Unfortunately, some very heinous offences, including two or three murders, were perpetrated. The writer cannot forget his feelings when, one evening, re-

304 The Colliers.

taming from the delightful marine village of Tyne- mouth to Newcastle, during these disturbances, and seeing a crowd about a pubUc-house, he enquired what was the matter, to receive for reply — " the police have shot a pitman !" This turned out to have been really the case, in a fray that had just ended. Another case, which created considerable interest at the time, not only in the neighbourhood of the col- lieries, but throughout the country, was the murder of Nicholas Fairless, Esq. a higUy respectable and humane Magistrate of South Shields, by two pitmen of the names of Jobling and Armstrong. The last named culprit succeeded in getting out of the country; but Jobling was taken, tried, and executed at Dur- ham, and afterwards, pursuant to his sentence, hung in irons on a gibbet, in a mere called 'Jarrow Slake," and within a few score yards of the spot where the fatal act had been committed. This gibbet was particularly obnoxious to the pitmen; and various rumours circulated to the effect, that it would never be aUowed long to remain an object of horror to so intrepid a body of men. A few weeks afterwards, the writer of this notice, and a friend with whom he was walking along the head of the Slake, were struck with the altered appearance of the gibbet, and on approaching it they ascertained from various parties, that during the preceding night, the tall post had been ascended, the end of the transverse piece sawed off, and the body carried, as was supposed, out to sea, and there sunk : no tidings either of it, or the persons concerned in the unpleasant and daring en- terprise, were ever received.

Chapter Xvi.

THE COAL TRADtJ.

Coo/ /iV if at all known to the nations' of Antiquity — Mentioned hy Theophrastus — Sup posed to have been used by the Ancient Britons — Old Cinder Heaps — Coal mentioned by Saxon Authors — Extract from the Bolden BooV — Charter to the Inhabitants of Iewcastle to diy Coals — Sea Coal — Evidence of Earty Modes of Working — Uostemen — Earliest Notice of Ex portation of Coals — Charitable Donations of Coals — Formerly burned along with Wood — Early states of the Coal Trade — Bichmond Shilling — Com plaints of the decrease and waste of FUre-mood— Historical Notice of the Introduction of Pit Coal into common use — EvelyrCs Lamentation on the Decay of Forests — Coincidence in the Deposits of Coal and Ironstone — Difficulties encountered in substituting Pit Coed for Charcoal in making Iron — Notices of the Coal Trade on the Rivers TynCy Weary and Tees.

XT is hardly possible to contemplate the prodigious amoimt of manufacturing power and domestic venience dependent on the produce of our coal mines,

30tf THE COAL TRADE.

without wishing to know something of the introduc- tion of so invaluable a source of national wealth and comfort It is, however, a singular circumstance, that we are met on the very threshold of the enquiry with two unwelcome facts — first, that there is almost as much obscurity as brevity in the notices on this subject which occur in our elder writers; and — second, that the use of pit-coal,* in a large way, appears to have no claims to very high antiquity, either in this or any other country.

Authors appear to be agreed that, the earliept express mention of Ibssil coals, used as a fuel by artificers, occurs about two thousand years ago, in the writings of Theophrastus, the scholar of Aristotle, who, in his Book on Stones, gives the subsequent very particular description of them : — '' Those fossil substances, that are called coals, and are broken for use, are earthy ; they kindle, however, and burn like wood coals. These are found in liguria, where there is also amber, and in Elis, in the way to Olympias over the mountains : they are used by the smiths/'f

PerhAps it may not be useleas to remark that the word eotd, or as it was formerly more commonly written cole, did not originally ngnify fossil ftiel, with which meaning, however, it is now generally identified, but wood or other matters used for fires. In this sense the term oocors repeatedly in the English Bible : and Thomas Britton, the noted mosioal " small coal man," was so called, not because he sold broken pit-coal, but little bundles of chop- ped wood or sticks, used for kindling fires in London. Coal, is represented in sereral of the languages of N.orthem £urope by words similar in sound, as eolf Saxon; kol, German ; hole, Dutch; kul, Danish, &c

f Hill's Theophrastus, p. 63. On this passage, the translator has the fol- lowing remarks : — The substance here described, whatever mistakes then may have been among authors since about it, appears to me to be eyidently no other than the common pit-coal ; and I have made it appear as clearly so in the translation, only by having properly rendered the word atpanHi, the carelessly misunderstanding of which word alone, has been the occasion of all the erroneous guesses about the substance here described. The an- thors of these seem all to have understood th3 word ay&pa(, as signifying fossil or pit-coal; and, therefore, as the author compares the burning of this

)

Early Historical Notices. 307

Sicculus Flaccus sajs, that coals, among other things, were used for landmarks; and St. Augustine describes them as applied to that purpose on account of their imperishable nature — a singar assertion, truly : they who pitch them," says he, " are wont to throw them underneath, to convince any litigious person, who should affirm, though ever so long after, that no land mark was there."*

Whether or not the aborigines of this island had any knowledge of the coal so abundantly discovered in later times, is a question that has been repeatedly discussed. Whitaker, in his History of Manchester, is of opinion that the primoeval Britons used coal. He argues first from the probability of their disco* vering it : " Our currents," says he, " frequently bring down fragments of coal from the mountains, the extremities [of the strata] rising into daylight, and being washed away by the rains and rivulets, — the Britons would soon mark the shining stones in the channels, and by the aid of accident, or the force of reflection, find out the utility of them. But we

abstanoe to that, tliey were neceositated to think of some other substance that he might hen mean, as it was impossible he should intend to eompara a thing with itself. Wormius, on this foundation, imagined that he meant the cannel coaL Quod Qalenus Tocat ampletidem, &c. Tbeophrastus Toeat carbones, quod eoram colorem habeat et vices gerat. Thus is Tbeophrastus, according to custom, accused of saying things he never meant; because the people who quote him have not been at the pains to understand him: tKxalofreu it k1 Wfvrrcu xodavip oi cuprtxiq, is evidently, they kindle and bum like wood-coals, or, as we call it charcoal ; tor that is the genuine and determinate sense of the word ay&p( in Greek, and carbo in Latin; as is evident from other woriu of this author, Fliny, and all the other old natu- ralists. Even the more correct of the modems, when they would express, what we call pit-coal, the substance here described by the author, never use the words affe or carbo alone, but always carbo fossilis, and \iavpct(. The similar use of this bitumen got it the name of coal, but always with an addition that distinguished it from what was more commonly and properly so called, that expressed its not being of vegetable but fossil origin."

Lib. d. Civ. Dei. 21, c.

The Coal Trade.

can advance still nearer to a certainty : several eces of coal were discovered a few years ago in the sand under the Roman way to Ribchester/' 8cc. 'Hiat the Britons/' he proceeds, 'were acquainted with this fuel, is evident from its appellation amongst us at present, which is not Saxon, but British, and suh* sists among, the Irish in their Guel, and among the Cornish in their Kolon to this day." In addition to tikis, we are further told by Pennant, that a flint axe, the instrument of the Aborigines of our Island, vtbjS discovered stuck in certain veins of coal, exposed to day in Craig y Larc, in Monmouthshire, and in such a situation as to render it very accessible to the un-

pable of pursumg the seam to any great depth. These statements are respectively unsatisfactory, when opposed to the mere presumption that had so early a discovery of the accessibility and use of coal really taken place, the would not again have been lost sight of, or at best so little regarded.

It is said there are no beds of coal in the compass of Italy ; yet the strongest argument in favour of the opinion of those,f who think that the Romans while in Britain, were ignorant of it, is, that there is no name for it in their language, the giuine and deter* minate sense of carbo being charcoal. Caesar, al- though he mentions the existence of metals, is silent concerning coal, in his description of our Island. That these shrewd people afterwards discovered and used coal can scarcely be doubted. " The Romans,'* says Whitaker, with great confidence, 'appear ac- tually using coal in Britain. In the West Riding of Yorkshire, and neighbourhood of North Brierly, are

Pennant's Tour in Wale, p. 17. f Brand's NcwtasUe, toL li. p. 249.

/"

Coal Early Known In Britain. 300

.iuany beds oTcmders, heaped up in the fields. In one .of which a number of Roman coins was found some years ago/' Similar indications have been met with elsewhere. Horselj, in the Britannia Romana, speaking of some inscriptions found at Benwell, a village near Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and the Conder- cum of the Romans, remarks, that there was a coalry not far from that place, which is judged by those who are best skilled in such affidrs, to have -been wrought by the Roms/'* It is also the opinion of Wallis,f that the Romans were as well acquainted with our pit-coal, as with our ores and metals : in digging up some of the foundations of their walled city Magna, or Caervorran, 1 762, coal cinders, some very krge, were turned up, which glowed in the fire like other cinders, and were not to be known from them when taken out"'

Toward the middle of the ninth centary we find ourselves on less doubtful ground. Whitaker, in his History of Manchester, mentions a grant of some lands made by the Abbey of Peterborough, dated a.d. 853, which proves, as it should seem, that this fuel was known, and in use amongst us, while the Saxons were masters of Britain. By this grant, certain boons and payments in kind were reserved to the Monastery, as one nighf s entertainment Ten ves- sels of Welsh, and two of common aie ; sixty cart- loads of wood, and twelve of fossil, or pit-coal : the words in the original are fcPselv: rouji jjiasran, translated by Bishop Gibson, ouodecem plaustra car- bonum fossilium.*' J No mention of this fossil ocaifs under the Danish usurpation ; that people, indeed, as

Brit. Rom. p. 209. f Hist. Northumb. vol. i. p. 119.

The Coal Trade.

Brand justly remarks, were too much peiplexed during their stay in this country, by civil commotions, to have had leisure to attend to any thing but what was obvious, and to be purchased with little trouble. So that wood would naturally be the cliief article of fuel, while immense forests and thickets presented them- selves to yield an abundant supply. It may be mentioned, that in the Bolden Book,'' — sort of Doomsday record of the County of Durham— com- posed before a.d. 11 96, we find that among the al- lowances to the tenants in villenage at Bishop Wear- mouth, the smith has twelve acres for the iron-work of the carts, and finds his own coal — oarbanem.'* For a few reigns after the Norman Conquest, during which time, our unhappy country was perpetually, as it were under fire and sword, the same silence, which must be attributed to the same causes, prevailed con- cerning fossil coal.

December 1st, 1239, King Henry the Third is saidf to have granted a charter to the townsmen of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, for liberty to dig coals and stones — perhaps grind-stones — in the vicinity of that place4 This licence, which issued on the supplica- tion of the parties interested, is the earliest direct notice of the actual working for coals extant : for, in the Leges Burgorum of Scotland, which were enacted about the year 1140, although a particular privilege

Surtees' Durham, i. 224.

f Gardner's England's Grieranoe Discorerodi p. 9.

t Namely in " the Castle Field, and the Forth.** Neither of these spots exhibit at the present day any traces of such operations as are implied by the grant : the former locality would he built orer, at an early period, and the latter has been noted for about a century as a fashionable promenade of the townspeople : but the fine lime trees with which it is sdll overshadowed exhibit symptoms of decay only less signal than that which has overtaken the custom with which they hare been cotemporary.

Historical Notices.

Sh

is granted to those who bring fuel into boroughs — wood, turf, and peat are expressly mentioned— there is no account of coal : these laws were made at Newcastle-upon-Tyne.* The strongest and most unequivocal proof, however, that this species of fuel was in use amongst us during the reign of Henry / the Third, is to be found in an inquisition preserved among the additions to Matthew Paris's History, of the date of 1245. Here we find it called carlo maris — sea coal — an appellation retained through suc- ceeding centuriesf — with express mention of making pits to win it, and of the wages of the colliers that wrought in them. We have an incidental mention of coal,'* in reference to its use in the southern part of England, during the reign of Edward the Second ; for, in an account book of the servants of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who resided alternately at Lambeth and Croyden, occurs this entry, thirtjr cart loads of coal firom Burstone to Croyden."| In the year 1281, according to an authority quoted by Brand, there had been so rapid an increase of the

Leg. Bnrg. c. 38, quoted in Amofs Hist Efinbnrgh.

f The term in the text, elthongh it has been so long in nae, appean gene- rally to have had no other meaning than as signiiying lea-bome coals, in opposition to sach as were dag inland. Lelaud, in his Itinerary, vol. viii. p. 19, has the following passage : " The vaynes of the se-coles ly sometyme npon olines of the se, as ronnd about Coqnet Island, and other shores; and they, as some will, be properly called se-coles ; but they be not so good as the coles that are digged in the inner part of the lande.''

X Assuming, that fossil coal is meant by the term need in the abore entry, we agree with a writer in the Atheneom who observes that the reference is ciuions, as Croydon was almost snrronnded with wood, and as coal, excepting at London and a few other towns, was scarcely ever need : it becomes there- fore probable that this ftiel was for the Archbishop's own use in his private chamber, as such rooms, about the period in question began to have the con- venience of chimneys and enclosed &n places. These thirty loads of coal appear to have cost SSs. 9d. a high price, when it is remembered, that the wages of a master-carpenter were but 4d. per diem, and wood might foe had almost for the trouble of carting it.

319 The Coal Tra0E.

coal trade at NeFcaatlQ, thAt, had not that tovm beeu granted before by King John at a feeaxm of on hundred pounds per annum, payable to the Crown that fium would probably have at least been doubled the then burgesses. From Ijus early period, the History of the Coal Trade becomes almost identical with that of the flourishing town from which supplies of coal have ever since continued to be so abundantly drawn.

Of the mods adopted for working the coal in those early times we hare no information: the first attempts would doubtless be on the exposed basset edges of the strata. Mr. Manmiet states that evi- dences of early operations have been discorered near Ashby: — Measham, where the bed was not more than forty or fifty feet from the mikce, indica- tions of ancient workings were found, in stone ham- m&c heads, and large wedges of flint with hazel withes round them ; also wheels of solid wood about eighteen inches in diameter.'' This statement, if correct, would lead us back to a very early period indeed. It is probable that delving in some shape would lead to making vertical shafts, as the latter led to horizontal excavation. A coal mine'' is men tioned in the ordination of the Vicarage of Merring- ton, in the counfy of Durham, in 1343 ; and in 1354 there is extant a notice of the " sinking of pits" at FerryhiU, in the same county.*

Brand, in his interesting History of Newcastle- upon-Tyne, has detailed in a chapter on the " So- ciety of Hostmen," Ostemen, or fitter8,f the parti-

Sartees, ui. 396.

f This tenn is at present used of those who fit" or losbd oools on bomj} / the vessels in the riTer— a sort of faotors between Uie owners and porohaseii ' of the commodity. It is observable, sajs Brand, that the title of thU fia-

EARLIEaT EXJDAT OF COAL. S18

ukm of mmt f£ lim legislative and mimiGqpalregu kttiQiia of the qmI trade up to 1780, ike time when he wrote. Such extracts thefefrom, as well as such ether notices connected AeiMrith, as may he most l&ely to interest Ihe general reader, shall he given* We have no distinct notice of the earliest shipment of aoal for London, though, as we shall afterwards find, the nse thereof in the Metropolis, was piohihited in 1806, by Royal prodamation ! Nevertheleas, within about twenty years afterwards, it appears to have been used in Bayal Palace ; as in the titiones in Parliamento/' a.d. 13arl~.ia22, a claim Li mads for ten killings, on account (rf fuel of that sort whidi had beflu ordered by the Clerk of the Palace, and burnt at the King's Ooronadon, but peglected to be paid fiir. a.d. 1835, a vess, the property of one Thomas Rente, of Pontoise, a town in the antient dominions of the Slings of England, in France, is mentioned as trading to Newcaatle-upon* Te with com, and returning with a frdight of sea ooal9.

Jn the year 1B27, the measure of seaeoal having become an object of considemtion, we may infer that this fuel was regarded as an important article in the commerce of that time in the next century

lemSty, Is often in fhe printed Journals of the House of Commons, mis- 9fltted fiUeisu" The mere Mident darigotioii of HitsiMPie long bom* this society is of uncertain etymology : some have derived it fton the Latip oiMtmojifit, i. e. eastmen, either from their trading to the eastern parts of Europe, or ficom their intexcwurse with men isom the eeast of Genasny in ihat narter. It appeals Icom the earUest entries in the hooks of this S- ektj], thai the atrazger anivig at the port of Xyae to boy ooals, is eaUad thfiba9le.*' Xheillonha dabbled: in ttfaiingspeenlatioaa; henoa we meet with the lasm<<€Ojl" in Abbey leases. TynemonthFiioiy hadaooUieiyatJraswlck, which in 1330, was let at the yearly rent of five pounds ; in 1530, it was let for twenty pounds a year, on condition that not mors than twenty chaldrons

314 The Coal Trade.

Uie still growing consequence of the trade is indicated by the terms of an Act of Parliament, in wliich it is set forib, that whereas there is a custom payable to the King of two-pence per chaldron on all coals sold to persons not firanchised in the port of New- castle, and whereas the keels which carry the coals from the land to the ships in that port, ought to be of the just portage of twenty chaldron, according to which burden the custom aforesaid is paid ; yet many are now making their keels to hold twenty-two, or twenty-three chaldrons, the King is thereby de frauded of his due : Wherefore it is now — [May 2, 1421] — enacted, that all keels be measured by Com- missioners to be appointed by the King, and to be marked of what portage they be, under pain of for- feiting all the said keels which shall be found not marked/'

iEneas Silvius, who afterwards assumed the purple under the name of Pius the Second, visited diis island about the middle of the 15th century. He relates, seemingly with some surprise, that he saw in Scotland poor people in rags beg;ing at the Churches, and receiving for alms, pieces of stone, with which they went away contented. " This species of stone," says he, " whether with sulpher, or whatever inflammable substance it may be impreg- nated, they bum in place of wood, of which their country is destitute.'* Doles of this, and other kinds

hOQld be drawn in a day.; and eight yean after, at iifty pounds a year, withoat any restriction as to quantity to be extracted. [Brand, ii. 255, 964.] In Bichaid the Second*s time, Newcastle coals were sold at Whitby at Ss. 4d. per chaldron : [Chariton's Whitby, p. 260]and, in the time of Henry the Eighth, their price was twelTepence** a chaldnm in Newcastle ; in London about four shillings j" and in France they sold for thirteen nobles per chaldron."

nej. Sylrii Opera, p. 443; and Amot's Hist Edin. p. 82.

Early Trade Notices. 315

of fuel are still annually distributed in various parts of this country in the winter season : nor is this by any means one of the least acceptable forms under wUch clurily pnte her gift, Ju pr..

In the celebrated Household Book'' of the fifth Earl of Northumberland, of the date of 1512, a re- cord, as Brand justly remarks, of singular curiosity, equally throwing light on our ancient manners, and reflecting lustre on the great family whose extensive plan of domestic economy it so minutely displays, mention occurs of this description of fuel, which it seems they had not yet learnt to use by itself, for the following extraordinary reason, bicause,'' observes this authority, " colys will not byme without wodd," Eighty chaldrons of sea coal, at 4s. 2d. and 5s. the chaldron were allowed in the year ; and also sixty- four loads of great wood, to make the coals bum. This last circumstance seems to prove, says Brand, that the coal owners had not yet discovered, or found means to win the deep strata of this fossil, or what is styled in the language of the trade '' the main coal.'' Some notices of the trade to foreign countries, at an early period, will be found in a subsequent chapten It may, however, be remarked that towards the end of the prosperous reign of Queen Elizabeth, the coal trade flourished greatly, and continued to be regarded

DonaUons of coals are very common in ierenl of the colliery districts ; nor were these always confined to the poor : in the earlier periods of the coal trade, the Municipal Authorities as well as the Hostemenof Newcastle, were in the habit of sending presents of the staple commodity of the town to their friends in London : this custom of transmitting gift ooals," was wholly laid aside before the end of the seventeenth centoiy. A keel of coals/' however, is the otdinary and acceptable present ot a Ncrthem coal owner, to a local charity ; and it is worUi recording that the late Mrs. Oliver, of Long Meifofd, Essex*, who died in 1833, left by her will, the interest of £4,000 stock, to be laid out in coals, and distributed twice a year for ever, to the poor of that place, by the churchwardens end overseers for the time being.

81A THE COAL TltADE.

ft an impoftant source not only of local but of go ¥erameat xereuue by succeeding monardis. The wbitnuy taxes ioiposed on thisvacte, and the shan- fill monopolies authorised by royal cupidity, contri- buted materially, as is believed, to induce the downfal of Charles I. After the Scottish armies took New- oadtle, &e House of Ccmunons b;an to direct the coal teade, and jgovem the town ; by step, they w&e cKoabled to send for the use of the poor of Lon- don large supplies of coals, which had risen to the price !Qi four pounds per chaldron." Notwithstanding this seasonable interference of the ruling powers, fu was so excessively dear in the Metropolis in 1648, tbat mai poor people were starved to death — a ca- kmity which was diarged upon the Governor of Newcastle, for the severe imposition of four shillings per chaldron upon coals.

At a shortly subsequent period, the prospect of ex- tmNrdinary gain led various adventurers to speculate in woridng the mines in the Northern counties. An eye witness thus describes the state of things Many thousand people are employed in this trade of coalea: many live by working of diem in the pits: many live by conveying ihem in waggons and wains to the river Tine : many men are employed in con- veying the coals in keels from the stathes aboard tbe ships : one coal merchant employed five hundred or a thousand in his work of coals : yet for aU his labour, care, and cost, can scarce live of his trade : nay many of them hath consumed and spent great estates,, and dyed beggars. I can remember one of many that raysed his estate by coale trade : many I remember, that hath wasted great estates. Some south country gentlemen have, upon great hope of benefit, come

EARLY TRADB NOTICES. BlI

into tliis countiy to hasBard their monies in coole pita Master Beamnont,. a gentleman of great ingiiiity, and rare parts adventured into our mines with liia thirty thousand pounds ; who hrou wiih<him namj. rare engiDes> notknown then in these parts — aa iksr art to bore with iron rods, to tiy the deqmesse: and' thicknesse of the coale, rare engines to draw watetf outi of the pits, waggons with one horse, to cany down. Qoales from the pits,, to the stalhes, to the.riyaf, &c. Within few years he consumed all hia moaeyf, and rode home upon his ligt horse/'

Duties wiere laid nponsea borne ooid, to assist in building St. Paul's chuich, and fifty; parish chuschea in London, after die great fire in thM aty ; and i& 1677, Charles the Second granted to his natural sen Charles Lenox, Duke of Richmond and his heirs, a duty of one shilling a chaldron: on coals, whick continued in the family till it was purchased by 60- yemment* This impost, so troublesome to the Tyne coal-merehants, and long known as the Richmond shilling,' produced, soon after it came into thehanda of Government, £25,000 a year.f

In 1699, Newcastle had two-thirds of the coal trade, and 300,000 chaldrons, in aU,. went annually to London. The oversea trade em{doyed 900,000r tons of shipping. Coals about that time> sold ini London for eighteen shillings a. chaldron, out of which five shillings were paid to the king-, one shiU Img and sixpence to St. Paul's, and one and rixpenee

Orej's Chorographia, p. 34.

f It was purchased of the Duke of Richmond by Ooverament i& 1799; for the sum of £400,000 ; since which tame, the whole amount, aUAvfflgfl per centjper annum intefeel has 'heea more than, redeemed bj the Income, an overplus of £341,900 having accrued to the purchasers. It was relin- quished hj Goremment, March' 1, 1831.*

318 The Coal Trade.

metage. It was tlien also stated to the House of Commons that six-hondred ships, one with another of the burden of eighty Newcastle chaldrons, with 4,500 men, were requisite for carrying on this trade. There were also then employed on the Tyne, four hundred keels, and from fifteen to sixteen thousand keelmen.

The subsequent extracts from Harrison's Descvp- tion of England, prefixed to Hollingshead's Chro- nicle, edited in the year 1577, contain some very curious and interesting notices concerning the coal trade ; and though they have frequently been wholly or in part dted by writers describing the changes of manners in this country, they are too pertinent to our subject to be omitted in this place. '' Of cole- mines we have such plenty in the north and western parts of our island, as may suffice for all the realme of Englande. And soe must they doe hereafter in- deede, if wood be not better cherished then it is at this present : and to say the truth, notwithstanding that very many of them are carryed into other coun- tryes of the maine, yet theyr greatest trade beginneth to growe from the forge into the kitchen and halle, as may appear already in most cities and townes that lye about the cost, where they have little other fewel, excepte it be turfe and hassocke. I marvayle not a little that there is no trade of these into Sussex and Southamptonshire, for want whereof the smiths do work their yron with charreoal. I think that farre carriage be the only cause, which is but a slender ex- cuse to inforce us to carry them unto the mayne from hence.

I might," contmues our authority, " here take

Brand. 1!. 304.

Waste Of Wood Formerly. 319

occasioii to speak of the great sales yerlj made of wood, wherby infinite deale hath been destroyed within these few yeres,* but I give over to deale in thisbehalfe; howbeit> this I dare affirm, that if woodes doe goe so fast to decay in the next hundred years of grace, as they have done and are like to do in this (sometymes for increase of shepewalkes, and some mayntaynaunce of prodigaUtie and pompe, for I have knowne a gentleman that hath borne three-score at once in one paire of galigascons, to shew his strength and bravery,) it is to be feared that brome, tnrfe, gal, heth, brakes, whinnes, ling, dies, hassocks, flaggs, straw, sedge, reede, rush, and sea-cole, will be good marchandise, even in the citie of Xiondon, wherunto some of them alreadie have gotten readie passage, and taken up their innes in the greatest merchaunt's parlors/'

This quaint writer goes on to contrast the manners of former times with those of his own : Now we have many chimnyes, and yet our tenderlings com- plaine of rewmes, cataxres, and poses ; then had we none but reredoses, and our heads did never ake. For as the smoke in those days was supposed to be a sufficient hardning for the timber of the house, so it was reputed a far better medicine to keep the good man and his family from the quacke or pose, where- with, as then very few were acquainted." Our histo- rian proceeds : There are old men yet dwelling in the village where I remain, which have noted the

This wMteiblneas of limber was a topic of lamentation with the poets. Old George Wither, in the motto under one of his carioaa Emblems," (published 1634,) tells us with what feelings he beheld

u xhe haToc and the Spoyle,

Which, eVn within the compass of my dayes,

Is made through erery quarter of this He,

In woods and groTes, which were this kingdom's praise"

330 THE COAL tkaoe;

mnltitude of cfaiimiieB lately* eiBOted; wfaeoreatf itt their yoong d&yes there waft not above two or thrM if so many 9 in most uplandisb townes of the riiie, (the neligiouift honsed and mannotir places of their hird always excepted atadiperadVeiitiim some great personages) bnt each one made his fire against a reiBdosse- in the halle whetehe (Hned and' dressed his meatef'be Aen with something like bitterness adds when (mr hoicses #er6 buylded ci willdwe tbenwe had oken<nen, bnt ncfwe that onr hkmses sm conie to bier made of dk&, our men are not onfy become willow biit a grit many altogether of siMW, which is sore alteration.'*

About fi% years afterwards the a{ihensions of Harrison relative to the decay of wood fuel appir tor hare' been realized : the grown timber had not only been generally wasted, but there had been an ntt tinifiy neglect in not planting fresh trees. Ttds want of wood, however, not only brought pit-coal into more common use for domestic household purposes, but Hkewise, in a manner compelled the adoption of it for other more important uses, as= motioned by one of our annalists. Such,'' says Stbwe,* hath bene &e plenty of wood in England for all uses, that within man's memory it was held impossible to have any wBsit of wood ; but contrary to fotmer imaginations such hath bene the great' expense of timber for navi- gation ; with infinite increase of building of houses with the great espenee of wH>od to make housold fumiturei casks and other vessebnot to benumbered and of carts, waggons, and coaches ; besides the ex- treame wast of wood in making iron, burning of brick and tile ; that whereas in the year of our Lord God

SMHreB Anwb by Honm; Lood. 16aS; foBo, lOdft*

/

Wood Fuel. 331

1306 King Edward I. by proclamation prohibjted

I the bumeing of sea-coale in London and the suburbs,

, to avoid the sulferous smoke and savour of the firing,

and in the same proclamation commanded all persons

. to make their fires of wood ; which was performed by

aU (Smith's only excepted); yet at this present,

through the great consuming of wood as afolresaid,

and the neglect of planting of woods, there is so great

' scarcity of wood throughoute the whole kingdom,

that not only the city of London, all haven townes,

and in Teiy many parts widun the land, the in-

habitants in general are constrained to make their

fiers of sea-coale or pit coale, even in the chambers

of honourable personages; and through necessitie,

which is the mother of all arts, they have of very late

years devised ihe making of iron, the making of all

sorts of glass and burning of bricke with sea coal or

pit coal. — Within thirty years last, the nice dames of

London would not come into any house or roome

where sea coales were burned,* nor willingly eat of

A rimilar prejudice preTaiU at this day in some parts of France. Mr. St John, in his " Joomal of a Residence in Normandy," mentions that Di Bennett, the Protestant Clergyman told him that he had reoeired orders to quit his house, becaute he burned coal ; and anotlier English gentleman at Caen, who had invited a large party, finding his drawing room very thin, and enquiring the reason, foand the French had staid away because U was under' siood he burned coal. What renders the preference for wood fires more astonishing is, that hesidee giving mnch less heat than coal, they are far more ezpenriTe." Unpleasant as the Aime arising ftom pit coal most he to persons nnaccostomed to it, the combustion of fresh wood most often he little less nnaooeptlble to others, oo aecoont of the pyroligneons acid eTolred : some billets, however, are perfectly free from saoh olyection, while others are even odoious. An elegant and acute obserrer has mentioned that the wood of the ash, when burned in a green state, will emit a fragrance like that which pro- ceeds from the violet or mezerion,and that this odour will difiiise in particular states of the air to a considerable distance, a property believed not to be ob. servable in any other British wood : it is in the country only that we can be sensible of this — and it ia particularly to be perceived in passing through a village when the cottagers ere lighting their fires, or by the farm house, when

Y

322 The Coal Trade.

the meat that was either sod or roasted with sea-coal fire."

The foregoing extract indicates with striking cor rectness, how great a revolution was at that time taking place in the application of fuel, not only with reference to the arts, but also for domestic purposes : the abandonment of wood, as an article of firing to which the people had been iinmemorially accustomed, was an affair not of choice but of stem necessity : indeed it is amusing to perceive with what bitterness some of the writers of the earlier part of the seven- teenth century, inveigh, not only against the increase of those avocations which led to the large consump- tion of wood, but more especially against the intro- duction of that very coal, but for the timely and ex- hausdess supply of which, it is not easy to conceive of the state in which manufacturers as well as house- keepers must have been placed. About the period here alluded to, the British iron-trade, which has subsequently assumed an importance commensurate with the superiority of our national skill, and the extent of the mineral resources of the island, was beginning to be pursued by men fairly awake to its advantages. To meet this growing spirit for the

this woody fresh cloven, or newly lopped off, is horning; as the wood diiei this sweet mell is in a great measure exhaled with the moisture, for in this state we are not sensible of any odonr arising from it different from other woods.

Refuse and rotten timber, or small gnarled trees of no Talne for the car- penter, still constitute the greater part of the ordinary firing in many districts of this conntiy : indeed, erery tract of woodland yields two descriptions of fhel; namely. Cord- woody or that which is laid in stacks during the felling season for the purposes of the charcoal burner, and consisting mostly of such bough-loppings and other waste, as cannot be turned to better account ; and Brush' wood, which, comprising rammel or spray, briers, and other matters collected in brushing the ground, is bound with withes into kids or bundlet, and sold to the bakers and others.

Localities Of Cqal And Ironstone. 323

smelting of the native ores, at a time when wood charred or green was deemed indispensible, an enor mous sacrifice of our forest timber was required : so much so, indeed, that Eyelyn, one of the most amia- ble of writers, complains most severely that such, should be the case, in his Sylva," an interesting and delightful work on Forest Trees; he remarks that, '' Nature has thought fit to produce this wasting ore (of iron) more plentifully in woodlands than any other ground, and, to enrich our forests to their own destruction ;'' to which he elsewhere adds his dirtBy a deep execration of iron mills, and ahnost of iron, masters too/' Mr. Hunter, after quoting the fore- going sentence, exclaims, ''How would he have rejoiced to have witnessed the day when the coke of pit-coal became substituted for the charcoal in this consuming process !''

It is a remarkable fact that the coincidences of locality which Evelyn has so feelingly deplored as existing between our forests and the great deposi- tories of iron-ore should, in reality and to an immense extent, hold good when applied to the geological re- lations of the latter substance to pit-coal. This cir- cumstance, although well known to the practical iron- workers in this country, appears to have excited less attention among scientific men in Great Britain than in France, where the enquiries of Descostils into the nature of the argillaceous ores of iron, led him to take a just view of this mineral phenomena in its most im- portant bearings. Although the specimens of iron ore examined by this ingenious chemist, had been collected from very different localities in France and also from England, they all agreed in one respect,

HalUmftliirey p. 17. Y 2

334 The Coal Trade*

that they had been found in districts abounding with coal. And the whole of his researches led to the conclusion that there subsisted a very intimate geo- logical connection between coal and the argillaceous carbonate of iron ; a connection so close, that the miner might almost with certainty regard the pre- sence of the one mineral as a proof of the yicinity of the other. Bnt it is difficult/' says Dr. Colquhoun, overcome the force of a rooted prejudice : although the memoir of Descostils must at once have carried conviction to the minds of men of science, that the most useful ironstone was co-existent with the beds of coal in the various coal districts of France, yet the nation at large, for a long period, refused to believe that they possessed such a treasure within themselves, and obstinately persisted in regarding the island of Britain as the envied and exclusive depository of that over

How largely the theory indicated in the preceding paragraph receives confirmation from the working of British mines, will appear if we only advert to the vast iron foundries in the counties of Stafford, Salop, York, and Derby, as well as to those in several dis- tricts of Scotland, and especially in South Wales, where the iron works of Monmouth and 61amo]f;an are the largest in the world.

It was the general introduction of charred pit-coal, or coke,t during the last century, and which was

Memdr on Argfflaeeoaa Iron Oie, Edin. Jonm. of Sdenoe, toL tIi. p. 924.

f In Rymer** FcBdera fbera occon, in leferaioe to the pvojoeted nonopo- fiet of the jeer 1627, a cherter to three penone for the eole practice of their new invention for the meltiiig of iron ore, end maUng the saipe into eail nurki end bars, with sea-coel and pit-ooal only. Three years aflerwarde this prqject was itself ftur outdone by that of another company to whom the King granted an exdnsiTe patent for a "new invention for melting, forging, or fining iroD, lead, tin, and sftlt j as also for the burning of bricks, tiles,

Smelting Iron With Coal. 325

obtainable under such favourable drcumstances in almost inunediate connection with the iron ore, that' not only arrested the destruction of our forests, but laid anew the foundation of our present extensive manufactures of native iron ; these, we find, were in a flourishing condition in the reign of James I. ; but firom that time the increase of inhabitants and of cul- tivation, and the subsequent decreaae of wood, caused this business to decline so greadj as to be nearly lost, until the substitution of mineral coal, and the con* struction of laier fiimaces, restored to our country this important trade.

The earliest unequivocal indications of success were in the operations of a person of the name of Dudley, a noted projector, who lived during the civil wars. It waA not, however, until a much later period, and after numerous experiments by different individuals with very partial success, and often at a ruinous expense, that the use of pit-coal was fairly recognised. The celebrated works of Colebrook Dale, in Shropshire, were established about 1740, and after some difficulties had been overcome, they were attended with complete success.* The work- ing of these furnaces led to the establishment of others in various places, for smelting iron with charred pit-coal, or coke : for a whfle, the failure of managing any concern was attributed to some pecu- liarity in the Shropshire coal ; but as the methods of preparing and using the fossil fuel became better understood, establishments rapidly sprung up in

lime, &C. with the Aiel of peat and turf, redaced to a coal, without the ase of wa-ooaly pit-coal, or wood.''

In fhe Philosophical TranBaotlons for 17, there is an aoeonnt bj die KoT. Mr. Mason, of what he saw and heard at Colebrook Dale, relatlTe to ezperinents then and there going on.

326 The Coai4 Trade.

almost every district where coal and ironstone abounded ; and thus were laid the foundations of that immense and lucrative trade in the smelting, casting, and working of iron, which in this country gives employment to so large a portion of the industrious population.

As might be expected from what has been stated, the history of our iron trade during what may be considered die era of transition from the use of char- coal to pit-coke, abounds with disastrous notices of the men who embarked on that sea of adventure, the confessedly hidden riches of which appeared perpe- tually to tantalise one and another with the hopes of discovering, under the form of charred pit-coal, a product more precious than the philosopher's stone ; unless, indeed, we could imagine that, under so spe- cious an appellation, the Rosycrusian experimenters really meant nothing more than metaUum martis,* the iron and steel of modem times." '' The names of Dudley, Ravenson, Sturtevant, Wildman, and others, stand on record, soon after the interregnum, as speculators in the wide field of coke-iron working; and the number of patents which they obtained, the money they spent, and the mortification or ruin they severally experienced, collectively tend to prove that we are much indebted to them for having cleared the ground to such an extent."

Various causes have at different times tended to influence the coal trade since the use of the commo- dity became general ; but notwithstanding the com- petition of the places afterwards mentioned, as well as that of numerous inland collieries, the increase of the trade at its most ancient northern seat may be

Cab. Cyclop. Manufactures in Metal, vol. i. p. 31.

Sunderland. 327

said to have been, with some exceptions, progressive. To instance a single period: in 1800 the entire vend from the Tyne was 686,280 Newcastle chaldrons, and in 1826 it was 844,965 chaldrons ; there was, however, a falling off in the next two years, the aggregate vend in 1828 having been 785,407 chal- drons. In 1830 the aggregate capital employed bj the coal owners on the river Tyne was estimated at about a million and a half, exclusive of craft on the river.

The early history of the coal trade on the Durham side of the river Tyne, is so completely identified with that on the Northumberland side, both parties loading at Newcastle, that it is impossible to note the earliest progress of the Wear collieries in reference to the navigation of the last-named water. Surtees supposes it to have been towards the latter end of the reign of Elizabeth, or in that of James, that the coal trade began to find its way into the port of Sun- derland, which, in consequence, gradually rose into importance ; whilst Hartlepool, the ancient port of the palatinate of Durham, dwindled in an inverse proportion into a mere fishing town. The burgesses of Sunderland, anciently known as Weremouth," were incorporated by Morton, Bishop of Durham, in 1634 : the export articles specified in the charter were, '' sea-coals, grindstones, rubstones, and whet- stones.'' During the civil wars, in consequence of Newcastle being stoutly defended for the King, the collieries on the Wear and the port of Sunderland became objects of vital importance; and it seems that the latter, in 1642, received a garrison for the Par- liament.

Hist. Durham, toI. i. p. 256.

328 The Coal Trade.

About the middle of the seTenteenth century (1654), we find the " Port of Sunderland by the Sea" mentioned, as beginning to be of importance ; since that period, its conmiercial prosperity has gone on increasing, and it has long shared with Newcastle the advantages of the coal trade. It may be men- tioned that the highest price ever obtained in the market, is for the best coal from the Wear. In 1800> the quantity of coals sent from the port of Sunder- land, including the coastwise and foreign transit, was 303,459 chaldrons : in 1828, it had reached 532,508, the whole exportation during the 28 years having been something short of 12,000,000 chaldrons. About the time last mentioned, there were nine or ten large collieries on the Wear, in connection with which capital to the amount of £600,000 to £700,000 is stated to have been sunk : about 700 colliers were employed; and in 1807, 7,518 ships, together of 102,454 tonnage, cleared with coals from the port of Sunderland. Coals raised from the Wear collieries, as well as from those upon the Te, are put into waggons at the pits* mouth, from whence they are conveyed, sometimes a distance of ten miles, to the staithes or spouts, and are either put directly into ships fit)m the staiths, or placed in tubs to be con- veyed thereto, or in hulk, in keels, to be cast on board by manual labour. And, as the Custom-house and other dues are collected upon the Newcastle chaldron, a Commission issued, 1 Geo. IV., for " the admeasuring and marking all and every the keels, pan-keels, and pan-boats and other boats, and wains and carta, used or in any time thereafter to be used for the carriage of coals for the port of Newcastle- upon-Tyne, and Sunderland upon the river Wear,

Stockton On Tees. 329

Cullercoates Seaton Sluice, Bly thnook> and all other places within the counties of Northumberland and Durham, and all and every the members, havens, rivers, creeks, and places whatsoever to the counties aforesaid belonging/'

Not only has the port of Sunderland for many years shared with Newcastle the advantages and regulations of the northern coal trade, but Stockton, also, since about 1820, has established a sort of rivalry in this important traffic. The great coal owners on the Tyne and Wear appear to make common cause, especially in agreements as to the vend, &c* from which those on the Tees are excluded, apparently as being unwelcome interlopers in the field of business. There are about twelve collieries, which send their produce mostly by rail-roads — in one instance for the distance of twenty-five miles to the Tees, the water of which, however, not being sufficiently deep at Stockton to allow of the lading of large ships, the trade to London is less pushed (in 1830 it was up- wards of 1,200 Newcastle chaldrons), than it is to the outports — vessels of 200 tons readily running up the smaller rivers. Some of the coal is of excellent quality, little inferior to the better sorts of the Tyne or Wear, especially the Old Etherley Wallsend : it is, however, tender, and therefore cannot be sent to market so large as some of the prime sorts whose name it bears, and which in this, as in some other cases, is arbitrarily affixed, because, as a Stockton coal merchant explained before the Committee of the House of Commons, the London purchasers hardly consider they are coals unless they bear that name."

Chapter Xvii.

Varieties Of Coal.

Composition of Coal — Gradations of Fossil Character — Mineral Arrangement — Brown Coal — Black Coal — Glance Coal — Sub-species of each kind — Varieties in the Trade — Difficult to identify several sorts — Qualities of Coal — English, Welsh, and Scotch Coals — Evolution of unconsumed matters during conmstion — Burning of Smoke — Stone Coal.

In the earlier Chapters of this Volume, we have entered somewhat at length into the natural histoiy, fossil relations, and geological position of coal ; having fiubsequenUy described the operations connected with raising it from the mine, we now come to notice those varieties which have been described by Mineralogists, and also to advert to the different qualities of this important fuel recognised in the market, as well as by the general consumer. It has been customary,'* says Dr. Mac Culloch, to regard coal as a combi- nation of carbon and bitumen ; but as the latter is itself composed of carbon and hydrogen, it is more accordant to nature, to regard coal as a bitumen, varying in its proportion of carbon, from the fattest

Specific Differences. 331

NewcasUo coal to the driest blind coal that bums without flame or smoke/* If this composition be as- sumed, we have, as congeneirs of the different kinds of coal, — at the lowest or descending extremity of an imaginary scale, and in contact with anthracite, the noncombustible plumbago or graphite, or, as it is commonly called, black-lead; and at the upper, or ascending extremity, cannel coal, jet, and black amber, approximating to those highly inflammable substances, common bitumen, asphaltum, and the fluids naphtha and petroleum. Another form of arrange- ment — and one, perhaps, neither less natural, nor less in accordance with the matter of the foregoing pages, would result from the construction of a scale, repre- sentative of the different changes ligneous substance undergoes in its transmutation from a recent vege- table state to its ultimate change, by a process of mineralising causes, into perfect coal : something like this has been attempted in previous chapters on the natural histoiy of coal.

Jameson, in his arrangement of minerals, ac- cording to the Natural History method,'* distributes the coal genus into three species, viz. Brown Coal, Black Coal, and Glance Coal: these are again divided into sub-species.

I. Brown Coal. 1. Bituminous wood, or fibrous brown coal : the fracture is woody, of a dark brown colour ; it bums with a clear flame and bituminous smell. This is the fossil found at Bovey, as already noticed: it likewise occurs, differing somewhat in condition, in many other parts of Europe. 2. Earth- coal, or earthy brown coal, which occurs massive, of a brownish or pitch black : it sometimes passes into bituminous wood, with which it is found, and from

333 Varieties Of Coal.

which it dilSSers prindpelly in its state of aggregatioD being commonly of a loose consistency. 3. Alum- earth, which flames when exposed to heat It is said to occur in vast beds in allnvial land : it has also been remarked, that where beds of brown coal have a covering of day, they afford good fuel; but, when the cover is sand, Uie subjacent coal is alum- earth. It is not found in this country, nor much used for fuel. 4. Common, or conchoidal brown coal, which is found at Bovey ; it bums with a weak blue- coloured flame, and emits a smell like that of buining bituminous wood. It is distinguished by a high degree of lustre, and conchoidal fracture : we find in it ironyrites, honeystone, amber, and a substance resembling retinite. 5. Moor coal, or trapezoidal brown coal : it is the most frangible spedes of coal ; its fragments approaching to cubical. It is not found in this country — though elsewhere it is the most abundant kind of brown coal.

II. Black Coal. 1. Slate coal. To this spedes is commonly referred the rich caking coal of New- castle, and of the other reputed coal districts. Mr. Hutton, however, considers the slate coal of the Tyne collieries, to consist of the true caking coal of the district arranged in thin alternate layers, wiHi the cannel, parrot, or splint coal, and deriving from this arrangement, its slaly structure. Slate coal is de- scribed by Jameson, as being in colour intennediate between velvet-hlack and a dark greyish-black. Sometimes it presents a pavonine or peaco<-tail colouring, sometimes a columbine tarnish. It oc-

splendid specimens of iridesoeat coal occnr in the anthracite of Penn- sylTania : sometimes the pieces are of a deep lich bine ; generally, howevflr, the colours resemble those with which our own coals are frequently tinged ; but the conchoidal fracture and lustrous appearance of the pieces combine

Branch, Ob Cannel Coal. 333

curs massive, and in ovoidal and columnar concre tions. It is shining or glistening, and the lustre is resinous. The principal fracture is nearly straight, and generallj thick slaty; the cross fracture is im- perfect and flat conchoidal, and sometimes even or uneren. The fragments are sometimes slaty, some times trapezoidal, or indeterminate angular. It is harder than gypsum, hut not so hard as calcareous spar : the lustre is heightened in the streak, hiitde, inclining to sectile, and easily frangible. According to Dr. Thomson, this variety of coal contains of con- stituent matters, the following proportions : — carbon 65.28 ; hydrogen 4.18 ; azote 15.96; oxygen 0.58= 100.00. It passes sometimes into cannel and foli- ated coal. 2, Cannd coal, in colour, and several other particulars, resembles the last named sub- species, has a large and flat conchoidal fracture ; it is so solid, and when pure, capable of receiving so good a polish, that snuff boxes and various toys may be made out of it in the manner of jet ; in Yorkshire it is called branch coal,* and is often sought after by

to render them far taperior to ihoie from the mines of onr own coontiy as nuttlerB of ornament In the maMoit which occur in Taiioos ooUieriee of Oieat Britain, the eolonn are more diiRiaely diatribnted, and although some - times yeiy deep, they are rarely shining. In Staffordshire, this beaatifol Tarietj is called peau-coal; pau being the provincial appeilation of a pea- ooek. The caose of the oolonrs is said by some to be due to the peoolation of aoidnlons and feimginoos waters; by others to the action of certain gases. The likeliest cause seems to be, the presence and oxidization of iron. Heat appears likewise to hare had to do with producing the colours : the writer has picked up from the old burnt rubbish hills about Newcastle, spe* dmens of hall-consumed coal, exhibiting a rery strong degree of iridescence. The tints, although appearing to pervade the substance of the coal, and asaliy accompanying its free deaTage to an indefinite extent, ooosist, neter- thdess, of an extremely fine Aim, induced superficially on the component bunintt of the mass, and may be easily scraped off with a penknife.

Branch is a provincial term applied to the above, and other descrip. tioDS of coal, when the layers appear to shoot through or traTorw the main body of the seam, from which they differ in quality, being generally more

834 Varieties Of Coal.

turners : it is however, commonly used as fuel, or .1 distilled in the production of gas, being, although often of a dull aspect, yet of a highly inflammable and bituminous quality. According to the late Bbhop of Llandaff (Dr. Watson), its common name is de- rived from the word candle, because in some places, especially in Lancashire, the poor formerly used it in the place of oil or tallow for lights. It occurs near : Whitehaven, in Cumberland ; Wigan, in Lancashire ; Brosely, in Shropshire; near Sheffield, in Yorkshire ; and also at several places in Scotland, where it is named parrot coal, probably on account of its flying about, and the crackling noise it makes when burning. 3. Foliated coal, occasionally occurs with the last named variety, either massive or in lamellar concre- tions ; it is of a splendent resinous lustre, softer than cannel coal, and readily disintegrates by ttie action of the weather, and, when intermixed with iron- pyrites, will sometimes take fire, in consequence of the decomposition of the metallic ingredient* Jame- son mentions, 4. Coarse coal, composed of granular concretions aggregated together, but not common in Great Britain: also soot-coal, of an uneven earthy fracture, and duU, or sometimes semi-metallic lustre — it is found in Scotland.f

inflammable. One sort of coal, locally called bruich about Sheffield, and much nied in hoiues, is of a stone-like appearance, Teiy bard and pondeioosy but so highly inflammable, that a large piece laid npon the fire begins in a minute or two to crack, fly about in shiveFs, and inflame: it conanmes rapidly away, if stirred, leaving few cokes but a large amount of earthy residuum. The slaty, cannel coal of Ayrshire, yields earthy parts, amounting to one- half of the whole mass.

This spontaneous combustion has sometimes taken place, when the material has been put on board ship, and caused serious accidents.

f Annals of Philosophy, toL zIf. p. 83. In his paper of the Composition of Fit Coal here refened to. Dr. Thomson only distinguishes four species, namely,— I. Caking Coal $ II. Splint, or light bum hard coal ; III. Cheny, or soft coal ; IV. Cannel Coal

Glance Coal. 335

III. Glance Coal. 1. Pitch coal of a velvet-black colour ; it is found in plates; sometimes in the shape of branches, with a regular woody internal structure : it bums with a greenish flame. It occurs in secon* dary trap rocks in the lile of Skje; andinavariely of situations on the Continent, where it is used for fuel, either in its natural state, or when converted into coke. It is of a still more compact, jet-like nature than the branch coal abovementioned; and, according to a report published in the '' Journal des Mines," twelve hundred men were employed in the district of Oude, in fSrance, in fabricating with the pitch-coal of that neighbourhood, rosaries, buttons, ear-rings, necklaces, bracelets, snuff-boxes, drinking vessels, &c. One thousand cwt. are yearly expended for this purpose; and to Spain alone, the value of 18,000 livres is sold. In Prussia, the amber-diggers, who name it black amber, cut it into various orna- mental articles : it was formerly known by the name of Gagat or Jet, from the river Gaga, or the city Gagus, in Lesser Asia where it was dug. 2. Glance

We hare alrMdj mentioned, that the highly compaet species of lignite, dsoominated jet, has been deemed by some writers bitnminons Fegetable matter in a state of change between peat and mineral coaL The learned Wallerine, and the celebrated Fourcroy, have contented themseWes with considering jet merely as asphaltam ; whilst others have simply described it as coaL Mr. Hatchet considers jet to be neither asphaltam nor coal, but an intermediate substance, which may be regarded as the first gradation from the simple bitamen, into those which are compound. Parldnson considers amber and jet as identical. In proof of this opinion, he quotes the following relation from the learned Dalecamp, in his Annotations on the Natural History of Pliny: — haye," says this author, ''a piece of jet which, beyond all doubt, has been digested for many ages in the bowels of the earth. It was dug out of the quarries near Narbonne; one half ot it is black, and the other yellow, resembling amber.** It is plain, that writers sometimes com- prebend under the terms jet and amber, substances of decidedly different origin: what is commonly taken for each, may haye been found combined as described by Dalecamp — but, that there is pure amber which has had a liquid origin, and fine jet with a decidedly woody grain, is undeniable. The

336 Varieties Of Coal.

coal. This sub-species includes four varieties: — Conchoidal glance-coal. Slaty glance-coal. Columnar glance-coal, and Fibrous coal. The first of these kinds is the compact anthracite of Haiij. Its colour is iron-black, inclining to brown : the surface some- times exhibits a tempered-steel-coloured tarnish; and thin pieces ring like metal. It bums without flame or smell, and leaves a white coloured ash. It is found in Stafibrdshire, and in Scotland. The slaty glance- coal resembles the last in colour, except where bordering on the graphite, when it inclines to a steel-grey, or plumbaginous aspect. According to Dolomieu, when reduced to powder, and heated in a crucible, it does not give any sulphureous or bitumi- nous odour, and on distillation, it affords neither sulphur nor bitumen. By exposure to a considerable heat, it bums without flame, and at length is consum- ed, leaving a greater or lesser portion of ash, according to its purity.'' This is the anthracite so abundant in the United States ; the cidm'* of our Welsh collieries, and the £/tW caul of Kilkenny. It occurs also with the preceding kind in Staffordshire, and several parts of Scotland. The columnar glance-coal resembles

ligneous origin of jet can scarcely be said to be dispatable. In the Cabinet of Mineralogy in LangnedoC) H. Chaptel preaerred several pieces of wood, wbose external part is in the state of jet, so that in these the transition from the vegetable to the mineral state may be distinctly observed. At M ontpe> lier have been dag up, several cart loads of trees converted into jet, with their original forms so perfectly preserved, (bat the species of trees thus bituminized can often be determined. A specimen of jet firom Vochery can be distinctly recognised, as retaining the texture of the walnut tree; and the texture of tiie beech can be traced in the jet from Bosrop, in Scania. The most singular instances, however, are those of a wooden pail, and of a wooden shovel, which M. Chaptal, whose authority is undoubted affirms to have been converted into pue jet

This is a brittle crumbling anthracitethe Bitntmen Oxenaius of the linniean system. The term, however, is frequently implied in this conntiy to any small reAise coal of bad quality which may be brought to mtaiknW

Glance Coal. 337

the last in colour : it occurs massive, disseminated, and also in prismatic concretions, from which its name is derived : like the rest of the species, it bums without flame or smoke. We are informed bj Pro* fessor Jameson, that it forms a bed several foet thick, in the coal-field of Sanquhar, in Dumfries-shire ; at Saltcoats, in Ayrshire, it occurs not onlj in beds, along with green-stone, slate-clay, clay-ironstone, and bituminous slate, in the coal formation of that district, but also imbedded in the green-stone; about four infles from New Cumnock, al, in Ayrshire, there ui a bed of columnar glance-coal, from three to six feet thick, in which the columns are arranged in rows like basalt, and which is intermixed with compact, scaly, and columnar graphite. Both the graphite and the columnar glance-coal are contained in the coal forma- tion ; and in some places, contemporaneous masses of green-stone are imbedded in the coal.* Fibrous-coal, or mineral charcoal, occurs imbedded, or in thin layers, in black coal, sometimes inclosed in pitchstone. It is met with in the different coal-fields of Great Britain, and in similar situations on the continent of Europe: its fibrous concretions and silky lustre distinguish it from all the other kinds of coal ; it is not certain that this mineral is wood mineralized — several of the varieties may be original carbonaceous matter crys talized in fibrous concretions/'

Besides the foregoing distribution, founded upon the external character of the different species, and adapted for the purposes of popular classification, a great variety of appellations are current in the trade, as indicative of the quality of the coals, and in respect of which, prices are regulated in the market. These

Jameson's Mineralogical Description of DumfHcs-sbire,

Z

338 Varieties Of Coal.

terms are generally taken from tlie pits or placed whence the coals are brought ; and in reference to the best and worst kinds, and even to several between these extremes, they are perhaps suffi- ciently distinctive to prevent practised dealers from being imposed upon, however litde they may assist, or however much they may confound purchasers in general*

About seventy denominations of coal are said to be imported into London, of which, between forty and fifty are sent from Newcastle. Amidst so many varieties, to say nothing of new sorts, or old sorts with new names which are constantly introduced, the distinctions must often be purely aaitrary; not one person in a thousand being, in fact, able to affirm or deny that the coals of intermediate quality are of the sort implied by the denomination. The coal meters themselves, when examined on this point before the Parliamentary Committees in 1830, admitted that they could not accurately distinguish between the different qualities, though they could tell best coals from such as were inferior, and also discriminate be-* tween two or three dLSerent sorts.

Where so much uncertainty exists, even in the judgment of individuals the most extensively conver- sant with the trade, how wide a door must be opened for fraud and roguery ! As, however, no suspicion ever attaches to the parties who first ship the coals from the pits, the London merchant purchases with confidence, the ship's certificate always accrediting the quality : but after the coals have onee been re-

This was not always the case in the earlier eras of the trade* In 1618, Id formation was laid in the Star Chamber against several hostemen and skippers of Newcastle-upon-Tyne for adulterating ooalk And again, in

Character And Quality. 339

moved from the vesael to the warehouse neither offi- cial vigilance,* nor personal interest, could always prevent those tricks of manufacturing, or substitution by which the price is enhanced by screening, mixing various sorts, and affixing to the inferior commodity as reputable a name as it will bear. / Coals may be considered as absolutely good or bad, when they are free fix>m, or much mixed with, hete- rogenous substances; and relatively good or bad as they happen to be more or less adapted for particular purposes. The " Wallsend,'*f or best Newcastle coal kindles easily; in burning, it cakes or runs together but not to such a hard solid mass as some other sorts, emitting, at the same time, a great deal of heat, as well as of smoke and flame ; it leaves a small quan- tity of dark-coloured residuum or ashes. The sorts of coals usually denominated in the London market " Tanfield,'* commonly bum slowly, cake very hard, and afford a strong and long continued heat: the other varieties are of an intermediate character. The Whitehaven coal is said to approach very nearly to

11, an action was entered in the same court, by Heath the Attorney Ge- neral, against the bostemen of Newcastle, for unlawfully mixing 40,000 chaldrons of coals.

In order to secure, as far as possible, that one sort of coals be not deli- Tered for another sort named, the late statute proYides, that if any seller or dealer in coals shall knowingly sell one sort of coals tor and as a sort which they really are not, witliin the distance of twenty. fire miles from the General Post Office, every such offender shall forfeit ten pounds per ton, for all coals so sold, and so in proportion for any smaller quantity.'*

f Wallsend, so called, as being the ppot where the celebrated wall of Sere- rus terminated on the northern bank of the Tyne, a few miles below New- castle, has, in modem times, been chiefly known as the site of a colliery yielding the most valuable description of coaL So important, indeed, is the appellation in the market, that although the high main seam which afforded the original coal has long been worked out, the designation has not only continued to be applied to some ooe other sort, as the best — but to soveral sorts which the dealers wish to recommend.

z2

340 Varieties Of Coal.

the nature of the Newcastle coal. In the better kinds from both places the former has been found to pos- sess one per cent less of carbon, and one per cent, less of bitumen. The Cumberland coal much seldomer contains any intennixtiu*e, than is found to be the case with many sorts from Northumberland. The Whitehaven coal bums at first with a clear flame, and for a long time, but at last cakes. The Wigan coal bums quicker, and cakes less. The Swansea coal bums slowly, and cakes. The Leitrim coal cakes only slightly. Caking coal gives out a great quantity of heat, and with attention, bums a long time ; consequently, where it can be procured at a reasonable price, it is commonly preferred.

For the steam-engine furnaces in Cornwall, diose coals are preferred which, in a brisker fire, clinker most; none but Welsh coals have hitherto been used. According to Mr. 6alloway,t however, the Swansea coal is equal in its effect. Uanelly coal too, has been strongly recommended, and found satisfactory. Biin- doney coal has also been spoken of highly, and appears to the celebrated engineer abovenamed, to possess decided advantages over the coal commonly used in the furnaces of the steam-engines.

Mr. F. Forster, in a series of interesting observa- tions on the South Welsh coal basin, published in the First Part of the Transactions of the Natural History Society of Northumberland, already adverted to in previous chapters, gives the following Table, as exhibiting the results of an examination of several varieties of Welsh coal: —

f On Comiflh Steam Engines. Repertoiy of Patent InventioiiB. Angiul,

Welsh And Scotch Kinds.

EAM8 I2f A LINE OF SECTIOJf FEOM NOBTH TO SOUTH.

SUme CoaL

Seam on M jnydd Bach Llan.

edi,:

Free Burning Coal,

Clyngwemon seam,

Penpryg aeam,

BUumimme Cook

Qelle GUe seam,

Llwchor collieiy 5 feet seam, GlobrftiscaeaniyAdairoollieiy

Volatile

matter,

percent.

Carbon percent.

BXA1C8 IN IIFFEEBNT PARTS or THE COAL BASIN.

Cox*s stone coal Cwm Zorch, Pool coal W. of lilaneUy, Bashy seam, Llanelly,

72J8

Inoombnatible eartby resida-

nm,per cent leaying in

combostion.

reatseamat Merthyr, 18.4

Pale yellow ashes,. 1.5

Heavy reddish ashes, .7.0 White ashes, 3.5

Red ashes.

Yellow ashes, 2U)

Yellow ashes, 1.0

Reddish ashes, 2.4

Do. do. 2.5

White ashes 1.0

A glance at the foregoing Tahle will show how varioas are the proportions of the matters entering into the composition of coal from the same hasin : one description of stone-coal containing 8k parts out of one hundred, of volatile matter, while one of the bitu- minous varieties yields upwards of 27 parts; and while one sort leaves, on combustion, only 1 per cent, of ashes, another leaves 7 per cent. The great seam at M erthyr, is that from which the larger proportion of the coke for the blast furnaces is procured ; it is coked in heaps in the open air, and produces a close- grained coke of a silveiy lustre, and very free from sulphur.

The Scotch coals are mostly what are termed open- burning, in opposition to caking coals. According to Mr. MCulloch, they cannot last so long as those from Newcastle; yield less heat : do not run together in burning, and usually leave a considerable quantity of white ashes; in these respects resembling several of the Yorkshire sorts. They make, however, a very plea-

Varieties Of Coal.

sant cheerful fire j and for most household purposes the best fire is said to be made of a mixture of the last mentioned, and the Wallsend coals.

Some of the inferior descriptions of coal contain so large a proportion of earthy or other impure ad- mixture, that tliey not only bum badly, but yield an immense quantity of dull ashes : several of these sorts indeed are sufficiently inflammable, and, for a while, hot enough; for bituminous shale itself will flame readily, and, while red, emit a good degree of heat j but it presently dies, and, when mixed with better fuel, as not uncommonly happens, a slab of it forms a most annoying obstruction to the burning of an ordinary fire j as it frequently costs nearly the clear- ing of the grate to eject the stubborn intruder.* When, as is the case with the coal from some dis- tricts, it contains a portion of lime, the ashes are not only abundant, but so light that they fly about m every direction. The presence of lime with a trace of magnesia, is often displayed in those whitish la- mina of a crystallised structure, which are distributed through the coal in the insterslices of its longitudinal fracture, the presence of iron pyrites is demon- strated by the great weight and brassy appearance of some kinds of coals. Tliis metaUic deterioration,

WUliams menUoDB a dasoripdon of bitaminoas shale or ironstone, or,

quanUtjr of the natural oil as to maks them ilame a Uttle in the fire ; and

u"i. L'H conadcmble quantity of the hard stradfied blaes, which will not only flame in a fire, but some of it will actually bum when fire IS set to it, though it will not consume. There is a species of pretty hard stouified blaes at Pitfinan, in Fifeshire, which bums so weU, that if a mall fire is once kindled at one comer of a hillock, it will bum throughout; but It is no less in bulk after than before it was bumt, nor does it produce any ashes. This blae is of a pretty good black colour before it is burnt, but the fire turns it to a pale red, in which it is so fur from consuming, that it

Evolution Of Carbon. 343

howerer although highly objectionable on other ac- counts is less troublesome in the burning tlian that of the lighter matter ; for while it MU in a ponderous reddish-coloured adt, and thus in common with earth and lime, tends to choke the fire, it does not produce so much dust to fly about a room.

The kinds or differences of coal mainly depend, as aliady shewn, upon the comparative proportions of carbon and hydrogen entering into their composition, and of earthy impurities totally incombustible. While some species of coal contain nearly a third of their weight of hydrogen, others have not a fiftieth. The former kinds are flaming coal, so pleasing in domes- tic fires, and especially fit for the production of gas for purposes of illumination : in the manufacture of the latter commodity, the cannel coal of Lancashire, and the branch coal of Yorkshire, are much used. When fliey are burned where a sufficiency of oxygen cannot pass through or enter above the fire, to com- bine with and consume the hydrogen as fast as it rises, a dense smoke is given out, consisting of hy- drogen and carbon combined in the proportions which form a pitchy substance. The smoke given off during the combustion of flaming coal in most large towns, especially the prodigious volumes of it emitted from the chimneys of manufactories, form a serious annoyance in many situations; though it does not appear that any directly insalubrious effects can be charged upon even so fuliginous an atmosphere as that of London ; there have, however, been various projects for abating the nuisance on a large scale.

The subject was discussed by Evelyn in a work entitled Fumifugium"; and by a person of the name of Frend, who in 1819 took up the enquiry, '' Is it possible to tree the atmosphere of London, in a considerable degree, from the smoke and deleterious vapours mth which it is hourly loaded?"

344 Varieties Of Coal*

That it is possible to consume the smoke of steam* engine and other similar fhmaces, is an undoubted fact, as it is constantly done in some places with com- plete success — and where not done, it may be legally presented as a nuisance in a court of justice ; still, as the process requires rather more expensive ar- rangements, and a little more care than ordinary, and as the saving in fuel is probably in no case cor- respondent, the inventions already made known for the purpose are by no means generally adopted.

A very striking contrast to tbe murky exterior of some of the large towns in this country, is presented by the appearance of the city of Philadelphia, over which, notwithstanding its thousands of coal fires constantly kept up, there is no smoke. The inhabit- ants mostly bum the anthracite*, or stone-coal, — a substance resembling the Welsh culm, the Kilkenny coal, and the blind or deaf coal of Scotland. These

One prqjeet was this : iiuitead of allowing the smoke issue by thonsMids of ddmneys all over the metropolis, that it should be conveyed downward into sabternmean condnits, and by them be eazried to large Tents outside the town, and there dispersed.

A writer in the Journal of the Academy of Natural Sdenoee at Phila- delphia, gives the following as the result of a careftd analysis of the anthra- cite of Lehigh: —

Water 6.6

rSUez 1J3

Residue by indncra-' lAlumine 1.1

tion of a dirty white 3.3, consisting of Oxides of iron

colour 3 manganese 0.3

In a specimen from Rhode Island, Connecticut, the results were : — Carbon, 90.03 ; water, 4.90 ; and the residue by incineiation, which was of a light brick red, 5.07, — consisting of ailex 2.14, oxides of iron and manganese 2M, loss 0.43 zz 100.00. The quantity of water contained in anthracite is no- ticed as remarkable in this analysis.

Anthracite Or Stone Coal. 345

coals are difficult to kindle, wbich may have given rise to their name; but when once thoroiihlj ignited, thej bum for a long time : they make a hot glowing fire, like charcoal, without either flame or smoke ; but owing to tlieir commonly emitting noxious ra* pours, they cannot be pleasantly used in dwelling- houses in this country, tliough tliey are in considera- ble demand among maltsters, dyers, &c. ; more espe- cially for the furnaces of steam-engines and breweries in those situations where smoke is a severe nuisance.

Chapter Xviii.

Conveyance Of Coal.

Earliest Methods of Conveying Coals— On the hacks of Beasts — In Carts and Waggons — Tippler — Staiths — Drop and Spout — Origin of Bail Roads — Waggons — Self-acting Baihvag — Keels, or Coal Barges — Method of Navigating Keels — Hostemen, or Fitters— Maritime and Biver Trade — Coal Trade the Nursery of Seamen — Impressment.

L HIS is a topic which might have been treated of with propriety in a preceding Chapter ; but as it con- tains too many interesting details to justify its dis- missal with a merely general or brief notice it will not be out of place to group under the above title some particulars of the mode of removing the coals, in the first place from the pits' mouth, and afterwards effecting their inland or seaward transit. To lay the coal in heaps according to the quality, near the place where it was obtained, and from such heaps to fill the carts, or panniers of beasts of burden, by means of shovels, was tlie ancient method with the local vend : to carry the article in sacks or baskets from the re- pository on board ship, would be the obvious sug- gestion of inexperience in reference to sea-going coal.

Corfe Ind Tippler. 347

la some places, as about Sheffield, carts are mostly employed in carrying £he supply of coals from the pits to the tovn, where, as the daily consumption is enormous, the number of these vehicles on a road between the town and the pits from two to four miles off on the east side, appears surprising to a stranger. At many of the collieries in the neighbourhood ad- verted to> the carts are filled " from the he," as it is termed, and the amount in corves estimated from the size of the cart, or more commonly it is taken over a platform machine and exactly weighed, the quantity being reckoned, either as so many corves according to a standard understood between the paittes, or paid for as per the actual weight. As it is well known that coal deteriorates and crumbles by exposure to Ae weather for any length of time, pur- chasers always prefer those descriptions that are fresh drawn from the mine to others that may be filled from the " old hef" ; when coal is sold under the forma drcumstances — which will always be the case where the demand is equal to the snpply, it is shot imme- diately from the little waon or corfe into the cart, by means of an ingenious contrivance called a fipfer,

ng. 37.

(fy. 37.) and which from its use, at Leeds gives designation to the measure of the waggon which it is

348 Conveyance Of Coal.

employed to empty ; hence, the price of coals is said to be so much per tippler, instead of so much per corf or cwt

A B (fig. 37.) represent two cast-iron wheels about three feet in diameter, and firmly connected fit>m the inner side of their rims by wrought-iron bars : at right angles with these bars, and coincident with the diameter of the wheels, are fixed inside, two pieces c, forming the portion of a railway cor* responding to the length and width of the corfe to be emptied. Thus constructed, the machine is poised on brackets, by means of central pivots outside the wheels, near the extremity of projecting timbers, one of which is seen at D j the whole being so arranged as that the pieces between the wheels shall fiall (when the tippler is at rest) exactly level with the platform adjoining the pit-hill, or the teimination of a short rail-road laid therefrom, while there shall be just sufficient room below to admit the introduction of a cart. With this arrangement, there is nothing to be done on the part of the carter but to back his vehicle under the machine at £, and then, on running the corfe F into the tippler, the latter turns partly round, shooting the contents of the corfe into the cart at e : aiterwards, the Utde waggon, which is kept from falling out by means of the cross bars, is, when emptied, easily, by turning the frame up again, with- drawn to make way for another.

It is by a contrivance having a similar object, though dissimilar in principle, and vastly more pon- derous in construction, that waggons, containing from two to three tons of coals, are emptied at once from the $taiths into the ships on the rivers id the north of England. No person can sail down the Tvne from

Staith And Drop. 349

Newcastle bridge to North and South Shields — a dis- tance of ten miles, without being exceedingly strack with the appearance of these inunense structures of timber, erected at short distances from each other, on both sides of the river. Places for the convenience of lading coals from the bankside into the keels, were no doubt constructed at a very early period ; and in the chartulary of Tynemouth Monastery, staithes' are incidentally mentioned so early as a.d. 1338; these were, probably, however, nothmg more than small wharfs or platforms, as in a grant, made by the Bishop of Durham in 1575, the lessee of certain mines is to have ''sufficient way-leavef to the water of Tyne, where he was to have a staith to lay the coals on/' The word staith is plainly derived from the Anglo-Saxon stafe, ripa, Uttus, statio navum. At Hithe, in Kent, the landing place is called the Stade. ''Where the pits,'* says the old Encyclopsadia Edinburg. voce Coalries, " are situated at some con- siderable distance from the harbour, it becomes neces-

These itaiths haTe often been the Bubjects of litigation and complaint, at well as of rioting, especially on the part of the keelmen on aocoiint of their projecting lo fur into and oTor the rirer as to impede the naTigation.

f In every period of the history of coal mining in the North, these " way- leaves** have formed an important item ot ezpenditnre, or covenant JleUns cAlmtiiiMt*' occurs. in the latter sense in alease to the Prior of Dnrham in 1354, CAimtfiiflii is a term often met with in grants of property to mo- nasteries, and implies a right of road to or through the lands appropriated. Mine proprietors or adventnren, who possess collieries which do not happen to border immediately on a navigable river or the sea-coast, most necessarily procure the privilege of wayleave through the estates of proprietors which may intervene between the mines and the place of shipment As this is altogether a matter of baigain between the parties, it must be obvious that exorbitant rents will sometimes be demanded. Lord Keeper Guildford tells us, in his Observations on the Collieries, &c. about Newcastle, written in 1676, that another thing remarkable is their way-leayes ; fn when men have pieces of ground between the coUiery and the river, they sell leave to lead coals over their ground ; and so dear, that the owner of a rood of ground will expect £20 per annum for this leave."— Nor'a LifntfGuiUlfin'd,

350 Conveyance Of Coal.

saiy to hare a store-house near the sliipping place, where the coals may be lodged until the Kghters or ships are ready to take them in. The waggon-way should be made into the store-house, at such a height from the ground, as to permit the coals to run from the waggons down a spout into the vessels ; or ebe to fall dovoi into the store-house as occasion may require. This kind of store-home is well adapted to dispatoh, and saving eiqpence ; for a waggon load of coals may be delivered either into the store-house or vessel instantly, with very little trouble ; and if the coals were exposed to the effects of the sun and rain, they would be greatly injured in their quality, but being lodged under cover of the store-house, they are preserved.'' When the waggons are emptied into a keel or vessel by a spout, it is called a trunk atsith : at Whitehaven, they are called steers* ''When a wagn lets fall its contents down one of these spouta, the noise at a distance,'' says Brand, ''very much resembles a clap of thunder. These wagons, after being emptied, are brought round into the road or waggon-way by a turn-frame, and each is drawn back by a single horse.'f The store-houses mentioned above are very useful, especially where coals of a tender description are not disposed of immediately on

The covered part of the magazine placed poaUel to the quay at White* haven, is stated, in the Life of Dr. Biownrigg, to he in length 115 yards; in hreadth, 19 yards; and in depth helow the waggon-way, 8 yards. It consists of 17,480 cubic yards, and, at cnbic yards to the waggon, will contain 5244 waggons of coals. The nncovered part is, at the aouth end, 40 yards long, 28 yaids broad, and 7 yards deep. Tt will conseqnently con- tain 2352 waggons.

f The waggons from the pits to the qoay at Whitehaven are managed in a similar manner. The waggon- way on which the coals are carried into the magazine, and to the difTerent spouts, has a descent, ftx>m the entrance to where the waggons pass out, of about one-sixth of an inch in each yard. The covered gallery along which the waggons are brought from the HowgiU Colliery, is elevated about 37 feet above the level of the quay.

Shipping Staith. 351

tlieb being drawn from the pit : the latter, however, is generally tlie case at Newcastle, nor does there at present exist more than one or two snch store-houses on the banks of the Tjne. The annexed is an out- line representation of the staith, by means of which coals are shipped from the collieries about Wallsend.

Fig. 38.

(fi-S' 38.) is the platform upon which the rail- rpad terminates : it is supported bj upright and cross timbers over the river. At the extremity of the plat form is a wooden shed b, across which passes a strong axle, having upon it four lai pullies, two inside and two outside the shed. Upon the two former, wind die flat ropes c, attached to the stout lever D, which is composed of two beams, (appearing as one in file), connected by transverse pieces, and working by bolt joints at E : upon the two latter, or outside pullies, wind on each side other flat ropes F, fastened

302 Conveyance Of Coal.

to long levers of timber as o. The weight h, which aloi with these levers is intended to coimteipoise the waggon i, consists of a pile of cast-iron slabs. In the qniescent state of the machine, this weight is at the bottom of the frame, while the npper end of the lever D, stands nearly vertical within the open front of the shed, — a cradle hung at the end of it for the reception of the waggon, lying, at the same time, exactly level with the rail-road of the platform a. In this state, if a loaded waggon were moved into the cradle or slip, and the latch loosed, it would rapidly descend by a curved line from the platform to the ship — the machinery in the middle stage of the transit appearing as in the engraving. To counteract how- ever, the dangerously rapid descent of the load, the axle in the shed carries, in addition to the rope- rollers above described, a large wheel of wood, con- stricted by a brake, and turning in the outshot k, where the staithman manages it by means of a lever. Commonly, a man descends with the waggon, and upon reaching the deck of the vessel, strikes out the catch of the trap-door or loose bottom of the waggon, thus emptying the contents at once into the hold. The weight H then descends, the empty waggon and its attendant meanwhile being drawn up to the posi- tion first described. Spouts have already been men tioned; one of these conveniences usually occurs along with what is locally termed the drop, just de- scribed. In the figure alluded to, L indicates the position of the spout, and M the tackle connected with a board to regulate the descent of the matters passing down. Small or inferior coals are readily loaded by the spout, the waggon bottom being merely loosed over an opening of the platform, and its contents suf-

Railroads. 353

fered to run down direcdy into the vessel moored imdemeatli*

In consequence of the intense interest which within the last few years, has heen excited in the public mind relative to railroads, and the accessibility of various publications in which the subject has been discussed, the reader will be prepared to hear that these vastly expensive and widely ramified lines of inland transit, had their origin in the railways laid down to facilitate the movement of the coal waggons between the above-mentioned staiths and the various collieries in the north. At what period these roads were first introduced, does not distinctly appear. Down to the year 1600, the mode of conveying coals firom the pits to the river, seems to have been by crt., .n L ordiB-T mui a.d in in,tt,ei by " panniers'' on horseback.* Half a century after- wards, we are told, many thousand people are em- ployed in this trade of coals : many live by conveying them in waggons and wains to the river Tyne.'f ' Soon after the last-mentioned period, we have un- equivocal mention of railways, constructed, as the appellation would inq>ly, of pieces of timber laid paral- lel upon wooden sleepers, and upon which, waggons with small trundle wheels were drawn along. An ob- vious improvement was to plate the rails with iron; and, remains of this description may still be seen about Newcasfle. The earliest satisfactory mention of iron rails refers to the year 1767, when six tons appear to have been cast at the great iron-works of Cole- brook-Dale, Shropsliire, and laid down by way of

Treatise on Railroadg, by Nicholas Wood, In this work will be found ample information, historical, practical, and theoretical, f Gray's Chorographia.

2 A

364 Conveyance Of Coal.

experiment — but with what success does not appear, Mr. Curr claimed " the making and use of iron rail- roads," in 1776, as one of his inventions," for workhig the Duke of Norfolk's collieries at Sheffield. The ingenious individual just named, formed his roads of light cast-iron edge-rails — and to him was probably due, if not absolute priority in the attempt to substitute iron for wood, yet the first successful application of metal for the purpose intended, by making a number of small waggons, and linking them together, so as to distribute the weight over a greater space, and thus to overcome a difficulty in the way of conducting the original heavy vehicles along the newly devised roads. It would be out of place here, to go into any details concerning the pro- gressive improvements by means of which rail-roads have arrived at their present pre-eminent degree of perfection and utility, in connexion with the use of locomotive steam engines.

Lord Keeper Guildford, who was upon the n<Mlheni circuit in 1676, thus describes the waggons and the waggon-ways : — " The manner of the carriage is by laying rails of timber from the colliery down to the river, exactly straight and parallel ; and bulky carts* are made with rowlets, fitting these rails, whereby the carriage is so easy, that one horse will draw down four or five chaldron of coals, and is an immense benefit to the coal merchants." In situations where these roads were inclined, and particularly when plated with iron, no horse was required to draw the

There was a tradition among fhe old people connected with the coal works, that the first waggon that was used for this pnipose in the TiciBity of Newcastle, was Uned with tin, and filled with the liqaor called punch. It is easy to coigectnre that the unloading of such a waggon would piOTe a ▼ery grateftil task to the thirsty workmen.— 59WmL

Self-Acting Planes, And Waggons. 355

waggooa, as withont sach aid they ran along veiy readily,, "and sometimes with such rapidity, that a piece of wood called a tiller, is obliged to be applied to one wheel, and pressed thereon by the weight of the attendant, who sits on it to retard the motion ; by the friction of which the tiller, and sometimes the carriage, is set on fire." The wooden brake thus applied upon die wheel is called a convoy and may still be seen constantly in use on the ral-roads about the collieries in the north. In some cases the wag- gons are of sheet iron ; attached to these vehicles, and, indeed, generally also to the wooden ones now- a-days, b a convoy of a better construction, bearing upon two wheels ; the waggon-man standing on a pro- jecting part of the vehicle, and passing npon a lever, as shewn in the annexed sketch (Jig. 39.) It is not uncommon to see a horse

yoked behind the loaded waggons in their descent; the animal by this means assisting to prevent their too rapid motion, and being also ready to draw the waggons back, after they have discharged their contents at the staithes.

The waggons are wider at the top than at the bot- tom, and when made to carry about fifty hundred weight of coals, measure as follows : — length at the top, 7 feet 9 inches ; breadth at the top, 5 feet ; length at the bottom, 6 feet ; breath at the bottom, 2 feet 6 inches ; perpendicular height, 4 feet 3 inches. These vehicles are usually made with a sort of tn-door at the bottom, which on being loosened lets the coals Ml through without further trouble tiian the striking of a 2a2

350 Conveyance Of Coal.

catch — a contrivance which did not

pertain to the original wagons. In many of the collieries, aa well on tbe Tyne as elsewhere, where the ntoalion is favourable, and the distance not too great, the coals are removed from the pit to the river or other (dace of loading, by means of what is called a self-acting railway, which is just so much inclined that one train of wans when loaded, shall, by their descent, bring back to the pit's mouth those that hare been emptied. To effect this, the two seta of waggons are attached to the opposite ends of a stout rope, which passes over a wheel, commonly placed in a hori- zontal position A {fy. 40.) at the top of the inclined plane, the velocity of the train being regulated by the con- trivance just described. In some in- stances, this object is effected by means of a connection between the horizontal wheel and the machinery of the steam engine. Atintervals often yards along the road, cast-iron wheels about die size of a man's hat, with a deep semi- circular hollow in the face, are fixed for the rope to &11 into as the waggons pass down — thus preventing the rope from being worn by tradling on the ground, and at the same time avoiding the friction which would be consequent upon leaving it so to tnul : when there is any curve la the road, as sometimes

Corves On Movable Platform. 35?

happens, the friction pullies in that port are set in a leaning position, with their hollows towards the con- vex aide of the segment, so that as the weight of the trains tends to draw the rope into a right line, it sustained and kept light by the ronneis, though its direction deviate never so much from a stnught coarse. It is not necessary in these self-acting roads, that there should be a double suit of rails all the way ; it is sufficient that they be doubled at the mid- dle of the line for about one hundred ysxia, in the manner shewn in the cut (Jig. 40., to enable the wfgons to pass each other as at b c, which, as the length of the rope never varies, they will, of course, always do at the same place.

At one of the coUieries near Sheffield, the coals are conveyed from the pit to the canal, a distance of about a mile, in small waggons, each containing six cwt. ; twenty-four of these waggons are placed upon a combined platform of three vehicles of fcnir wheels each (Jiff. 41, which runs along a rail-road, self- Fig. 41.

acting by means ef a plane, as above described. On reaching the coal wharf, these waggons are trans- ferred severally from the stage to a small rail-road, where, on account of their convenient size, they are easily managed. In tbis instuice, the friction wheel A (fig. AO.) consists of three several peripheries on the same vertical shatl — the uppermost of metal.

358 Conveyance Of Coal.

eight feet in diameter, with a deep grove in its periphery for the passing of the rope; the next a wooden one, with a clip and brake to curb its velocity ; and the undermost a cog-wheel of cast-iron connected with the pinion of a shaft belonging to a small inde- pendent steam-engine.

On the canals, and on several of our navigable rivers, coals are distributed for inland consumption by means of barges of different sizes.

On the Tyne, the coals used to be carried from the staiths to the ships, almost exclusively, in a sort of oval vessels, called keels, of which, considerable numbers are still employed in bringing down the produce of the collieries situate above Newcastle bridge (which the sea-going craft cannot pass,) to the ships lying about Shields, and which do not load at any of the staiths between those places. A keel is considered to contain by admeasurement, eight Newcastle chaldrons : the coals, when large, are generally piled in the vessel according to conve- nience ; and when small, deep side-boards are added, within which the commodity is heaped up ; but, in some cases, where the coal is tender, tubs are used to prevent the breakage as much as possible. These tubs are a sort of waggons without wheels, containing one Newcastle chaldron, or 53 cwt. each ; eight of these being placed in a keel, go to the vessel, into which the tub is lifted by means of a crane, and when immediately over the hatchway, the trap-door is loosened, and the contents let down into the ship with as little injury as possible.

These keels, which are evidently built after an ancient model, and the method of managing them, present striking features in the navigation of the

Keels On The Tyne* 359

iiTer : the keelmen, too are an exceedingly hardy and striking class of men whose avocations under the designation of kelers'' are mentioned so early as 1378. Their vessels were afterwards called lightners/' apparently modified for euphony's sake into the modem lighter. The chief person on board the keel, is called the skipper ; an errand boy, or assistant, the P. D. ; the cabin of the keel is called the huddock ; and the great oar, which is used as a kind of rudder at the stem of the vessel, is the swape; the poles with which the keelmen push on their keels in shallow water, when it is inconvenient to use sails or ears, are called puys : the keels on the Wear are wholly mansed by means of these puys.

Perhaps the description of the method of navigating these vessels, as given by Brand,f cannot be essen- tially improved : one man on each side of the vessel going towards the prow, puts down his pole to the bottom, in a position inclined towards the head of the keel ; at the same time, throsting against it forcibly with his shoulder, and walking down on the gangway towards the stem, as the keel moves und him ; by this means the keel gains a tolerably quick and even course on the water : having walked the whole length of the vessel, they pluck up the puys, return hastily to the prow, put them down again, and thrust as

Keel-MMe if a tam aaed for 4hi8 daas of watennen — as bailies— piobably deriTsd from the obsolete a4}ective boolie, beloved — is a common appellation among tfie people ooncemed Ib the coal works for brothers Brand mentions a pauper who, giving an account of himself and funily before the offioen of a parish in Newcastle, in order to obtain a settlement told them (inter alia) that his father had brought up six of them bullies," i. e. had brought up six sons. Such a clause, adds the relator, had it oc- curred in a deposition in the oifice at Bow- street, would have justly alarmed a London audience with the account of such a brood to be let loose upon the town!

t Hist Newcastle, ii. 262.

360 Conveyance Of Coal.

before. Dr. Stukely tins describes the method of navigating keels, in his Itinerary, about flie year 1725 : — " The manner of rowing their great \mges (at Newcastle,) is also very particular, and not un- worthy of remark ; four men manage the whole ; three to a great and long oar, that push it forward, and one to another such a-stem, that asasts the otlier's motion, but, at the same time, steers the keel, and corrects the bias the other gires it." " These

Fig. 41

boats," says Pennant, " are strong, clumsy, and oval, and cany twenty tons a-piece ; they are navigated with square sails, but generally by two very la: oars, one on the side plied by a man (generally two men) and boy; the other at the stem by a single man, serving both as oar and rudder."

In discharging these river craft into the regular traders above Tynemouth, some of the coals are occa- sionally scattered overboard ; these, with considerable quantities sometimes brought from the German ocean on the flowing of the tide, form the perquisite* of a

AstnillarpnoUce oblalniKt the mnnthof IheWeaj: (he peraoDS vmiUng tor Ihd riiiing and receuloD of the tide, when eoaU ue left od the andi, prewDtaMene of conridenble Rctirlly tnd entntalDinent; tor In Iheir aoiistj to obtain Iha adTuitagea of 1>eiDg fttiemoet, they IVeqiiratly punae the receding lurgs loo far, when, by its reflni. they beoome drenched wid ometlmei tnnnerwd in watar to the middle. It hu been Mated that before the eitabliahnient of varions mannfutorieB afforded better employ- ment to the poor, ai many SOU penooi at a time hare been uotleed par- ning thtl eingolar occapatioD. Tbe common belief on the spot that most of the coal Ibui dragged up from the bed of tbe riier, li part of tbo

Hostemen Or Fitters. 361

number of poor people who with their little cobles, ropes, and nets, are constantly to be seen dredging for diem in the Tyne between North and South Shields. The wives and daughters of the hardy race above-described, are called, from the service they perform, keeldeeters : they sweep the keels, and have the sweepings for their pains.

We find all business between the actual pitmaster or coal dealer at Newcastle, and the merchants arriv- ing in that port by sea, was transacted toward the middle of the sixteenth century, by a class of local factors called hostmen," in whose service the keels above-described were employed, and who, moreover, appear to have been the entertainers of the masters of coal ships, while the latter lay in the Tyne. Ac- cording to Brand, the 'oastmen** had existed as a

cargoes of ships that hare sank out at sea : we recollect, however, on one occasion to have heard a gentleman contend, that as the quantity was greater than conld be accounted for on the aboTe supposition, it was more likely, assuming the hypothesis that the German Ocean itself was an immense coal-basin, that the small coal in question is, by the action of the tides, abraded from the basset edges of submarine strata, and then washed up the estuary.

The cause of their appointment seems to be contained in the subsequent statute, 6 Hen. IV. cap. 9. (a.d. 1404,) Marchants Aliens. And also it is ordained and stablished that in everie towne and porta of the sea in England, where the said marchaits aliens or strangers be or shall be repairing, suffi- cient hoostes shall be assigned to the same marchants by the maior, sheriffes or bailiffes of the said cities, townes and portes of thci sea; and that the said marchants sliens or strangers shall dwell in none other place, but with their said hoostes so to be assigned, and that the same hoostes so to be assigned hall take for their trauail in the manner as was accustomed in olde time." Statutes, by Barker. 1587. Here, the term host" is used in the good old English sense of an hospitable entertainer; in the following Act, recited at a Court holden Feb. 3, 1600, Ann. Regine Eliz, 43, we find the word applied both to the master and the guest : — Yt is further ordered by th' aucthory tyo aforesaide the said day and yeare that no free brother of this feUoship of hostmen shall henceforth either himself or his servants or any other for him, go or send to the sheeles [Shields] or the ballist shores or within any part o( the ryrer of Tyne or any place without the walles of the said towne to talke or speake wiUi the owner, master or purser of any sbipp, hoie, or other

363 Conveyance Of Coal.

guild or fraternity in the town of Newcastle from time immemorial, before their incorporation by royal charter, which is said to have been granted on the following occasion: — About the year 1599, Queen Elizabeth requiring of the mayor and burgesses of the town, the great arrears of a duty payable to the crown, of twopence per chaldron on coals sold to non* freemen in the port of Tyne, the date of the origin of which can only be conjectured, but of which there is express mention in a statute, a. d. 1420, it appear- ed, that the payment of this impost had been so long neglected, that they found themselves unable to com- ply with her request ; on which they besought her Majesty to remit them the sum, and to incoiporate the old guild of hostmen, who, on their incorporation, should, by a grant to the Queen, her heirs and suc- cessors, oblige themselves, and their successors, for ever, to pay one shilling for every chalder of coals exported from thence to the free people of England. So writes one author ; but they themselves, in their own grant affirm, that they were influenced by more generous motives, and that what they did, arose from their gratitude to her Majesty for incorporating them by charter, as also to assist her, then labouring under excessive charges in support of the realm against its foreign enemies* From an account of the state of the coal-trade at

tmmI whataoeTer upon the water to leame whose oaste he U, thereby to piocnre him to be his oaste or to withdraw him from his olde oaste by any kind of meanes, &c." The hostelers*' in the port of Tarmoath seem greatly to hare resembled the hostmen in the coal trade at Newcastle, and were, like the latter, a kind of mediators between the buyers and seUers. Camden, in his Britannia, giyes the following etymon : — the word hostmen may not improperly be taken to be traders into the eastern parts of Europe, and may hare their name from the Latin word ottt/manm, Le. the eastemen, as trading Into Chose parts, as well as those who came from the sea-coast of Germany into Ireland, &c."

The Civil Wars. 363

Newcastle-upon-Tyne, dated February 26th, 1602, and preserved in the books of the above fraternity, there appear to have been at that time twenty-eight acting fitters, or hostmen, who were to vend by the year, 9080 tons of coals, and find eighty-five keels for that purpose : the prices ordered were, for the best sort not above ten shillings the chaldron; for the second bet sort, not above nine shillings ; and for the third kind, called there, the meane coles,* not above eight shillings for the like quantity. A.D. 1603, complaint was made to the King, of great wrongs done to the mayor and burgesses of New-* castle-upon-Tyne by the hostmen of that town : this matter, which appears to have arisen from refiising to admit into that fraternity, such as were free of the twelve mysteries of the town, was referred to the Lord President of the Council at the work, at York, who made a decree, in consequence of which, great numbers out of the mysteries were admitted fie hosts." f Twenty years afterwards, namely, in 1622, there were vended by the society of hostmen of New- castle, 14,420 tons of coals.

During the struggle between Charles the I. and his Parliament, the coal trade suffered dreadfully: grievous imposte were exacted from the owners and dealers on the Tyne, who, partly from their loyalty, and partly fit>m the insecurity of sea-going vessels afterwards, were almost ruined. Meanwhile, the in-

This Society are also called " FUUrs,** horn tlieir immediate rocation being to fitt and load coalea abord tlie keelea." It ia hj thia appellation that the members of the fraternity are better known of late years. Those illustrions jurists, Lord Eldon and Lord Stowell, were the sons of a coal fitter at Newcastle. It has been remarked, that in the printed joomalB of the House of Commons, the title of this ftatemity is often by mistake spelled fiUers.** There is no intervention of fittersin the sale of coals on the Wear.

t Brand, vol. ii. p. 273.

364 Conveyance Of Coal.

habitants of London and especially the poor, were perishing for want of fuel. A more serious calamity had nearly be&llen the coal-owners at Newcastle : when the Scots besieged the town, the Marquis of Newcastle ordered all the mines to be fired. This was only prevented by General Lesley's surprising all the boats and vessels. When the town had been taken by the Scottish forces, the House of Commons took the management of the coal trade into their own hands; and a great quantity of coals were subse- quently sent up to London, where they had previously risen to the enormous price of four pounds per chaldron.

Under the Protectorate, the collieries were set to work with redoubled vigour : the river swarmed with barges carrying coals between the staithes and the ships. In 1655, about three hundred and twenty keels appear to have been employed upon the Tyne in carrying the coal to the ships. In 1690, one thousand four hundred ships are said to have been employed in the coal trade, exporting yearly from Newcastle, two hundred thousand chaldron of coals f in time of peace. Newcastle had, at that time, two- thirds of the coal trade; three hundred thousand chaldrons in all coming annually to London. The over-sea trade in this article, at the same time, is said to have employed nine hundred thousand tons of shipping, the coal trade, indeed, being reckoned, at that period, the greatest body of English shipping.

In 1 703, upon an inquiry of a Committee of the House of Commons, appointed to receive proposals,

\Vhiteiock*s Memorials, p. 27.

f NowcasUe measure j of which 136 chaldrons are eciual to 217 London

measure

NURSERY FOR 8EAM£lf 865

and prepare heads of a Bill for Uie increase of seamen, and the speedy manning of the royal navy, sent to the masters of the Trinity House of Newcastle, con- cerning the number of ships, &c., necessary for the coal trade : they were answered by that fraternity, that six hundred ships, one with another, each of eighty Newcastle chaldrons, with four thousand five hundred men, were requisite for the carrying on of that great branch of commerce. A number," they added, 'both of ships and men, that had been engaged therein for three years last past." In the following year, the Lords gave their assent to an Act for the increase of seamen, and security of the coal trade. From Christmas, 1 704, to the year 1 710, there appear to have been exported from Newcastle communibtis annisy 178,143 chaldrons of coals ; and from the port of Sunderland, in the same time, 65,760 chaldrons. Brand adds, that in the year 1 764, there were exported from the river Tyne for London, and coastways, 20,000 chaldrons of coals, London measure, and 40,000 chaldrons like measure, for foreign parts, more than had been exported in any one year. In the same year, 3,727 vessels were cleared out of that river for the coast, laden with coals, and 365 for foreign parts; a greater number than ever was known before.

These statements, in some sort, anticipate the sub- ject of the succeeding chapter, to which, perhaps, they more properly belong ; but they are introduced here to show the vast extent to which, at the periods above- noted, our maritime and river population were engag- ed in the transit of one single article of fuel. When to the tonnage and manning of the ships above-men- tioned, we add upwards of four hundred keels, and sixteen hundred keelmen employed on the Tyne

366 Conveyance Op Coal.

alone, we shall not doabt the propriety of an expres- sion frequently used during the last century, and especially during the late war, — that the coal trade is Great Britain's best nursery far seamen. Most em- phatically does the history of our marine attest the truth of this sentiment : but while recording the bravery and the loyaltf of the hardy race of men, who were at first cradled upon the water in the coal barges, and inured to toils in the Tyne, the Wear, and the Tees, who does not feel a mingling sensation of shame for his honour as an Englishman, when he recollects how often those very men were conveyed, nolens vdenSy from their own craft on board King's ships, by the detestable system of impressment, so prevalent during past years !

Since the above passage was written, an unsuc- cessful attempt has been made in Parliament to re- lieve the nation from the odium of impressing its seamen. The subject, as connected with the Tyne, has likewise been worked up into a tale by Harriet Martineau — not, however, with the success displayed in some others of that series produced by this inge- nious political economist. The kidnapping of these hardy keelers by press-gangs, for the manning of King's ships, is a crime of old practice. In 1693, the coal trade of Newcastle suffered great interrup- tion, the keelmen there being afraid to work, on ac- count of the impress for seamen j and in one quarter of the year 1 783, five hundred and eighty-four keel- men took out protections to avoid being impressed to go on board his Majesty's ships of war ; as did the next quarter, seven hundred and ninety-eight of the same body : many infirm individuals, and those above and under age to be pressed, took out no protections.

Chapter Xix.

The London Coal Trade.

Early Legislative Regvlatiom — Use of Pit Coal formerly prohibited in London — Growth of the Coal Trade — Duties laid upon Coal — Regtdation of the Vend — Charges upon a cargo of Coals at the place of Shipment and Coastwise — Charges in the Port of London — Enactments relative to the Coal Trade — Method of transacting business — Ship and Land Meters — Coal Bushel — Parlia- mentary Enquiries — Opinions of the Committees — Proposal to substitute Sale by Weight in lieu of Sale by Measure — Breakage of Coal — Sales by the Chaldron abolished by Act of Parliament, and Sales by the Hundredweight authorised — Suspen sion of the Law respecting Meterage — Duties chargeable upon Coal — Discharge of the Cargoes of Vessels in the Thames— Progressive State of the Trade.

fL SERIES of legislative enactments which it would be tedious to detail here, from the commencement of the intercourse between the northern collieries and London, regulated the trade in coals to the metropolis, as well as the lighterage from vessels on the Thames,

368 The London Coal Trade.

and the modes of sale and distribution to the inhabi- tants. As evils have grown up in the existing system, or new provisions have been called for, these enact- ments have been revised by the Government for the time being ; rarely, however, including the sacrifice of any of those numerous imposts on the commodity, which, accumulating through ages, rendered this kind of fuel so expensive to the consumers. London, however, has no particular reason to complain on the whole ; and of late years, competition, and an abun- dant supply, have prevented prices firom becoming oppressive ; and this, notwithstanding the fraudulent practices on the part of the retailers, which appear to have been carried on to a great extent

The use of sea-coal, as we have already seen, was prohibited at London, in the year 1306, by royal proclamation. Brewers, dyers, and other artificers, who had occasion for great fires, had even at that time,. found their account in substituting this fossil for dry wood and charcoal ; but, so general was the prejudice concerning it, that the Nobles and Commons assembled in Parliament, complained against the use thereof as a public nuisance, which was thought to corrupt tiie air with its stink and smoke. A regard to private interest caused the first proclamation to be but little noticed : on a second complaint, the King issued a commission of Oyer and Teifminer, with strict orders to punish the delinquents by fines, and the demolition of their furnaces *and kilns : it does not, however, appear, that this severe edict was less nugatory than that preceding it. Twenty years after- wards, sea-coals appear so far to have grown into estimation, as to have been used in the royal palace : and we hear nothing more of legal objections to their

Metropolitan Imposts. 369

use in London, though the prejudices against them, in some sort, continued long after the trade had be- come very considerable; indeed, almost until the popular complaint was transferred from the miell and smoke of pit-coal, to the wasteful oonsomption and decay of the forests.

The imposts subsequently laid upon the coal trader have not only contributed to enrich the coffers of every Sovereign, from the time of Edward the Third, or earlier, but have, in one or two instances, been made directly advantageous to the city : for it appears, that Sutton, the founder of the Charter House, de- rived much of his wealth from the northern coal mines, leased to him by Queen Elizabeth, on advan- tageous terms. And, for the building, finishing, and adorning of St. Paul's Church, then rising over the ashes of the great fire," there was given by Parlia ment, an imposition charged on sea-coal imported at the port of London, viz. of two shillings per chaldron or ton, from the first of May, 1670, to the 24th June, 1677 ; and three shillings per chaldron fix>m the 24th of June, 1677, to the 20th September, 1687 ; and three fourths of the money raised by the former, and one half of the money raised by the latter Act, was to be employed towards the rebuilding of fifty-two parish churches ; one fourth of the latter sum, was to be applied towards the rebuilding of St. Paul's. Again, by another Act of Parliament, 1 James II., an imposition on. coals of eighteen-pence per chaldron or ton, was granted, to continue from the 29th of September, 1687, to the 29th Septanber, 1700, two. thirds whereof was ajlied towards the carrying on the building of this church. Before proceeding to detail the statutable regulations of the London coal

2b

370 The London Coal Trade.

trade, it may be mentioned that at Newcastle, there exist certain regulations of long standing, which directly affect both price and supply. These are, more particularly, in the first place, what is called the " Regulation of the Vend,** a sort of compact entered into among the principal coal owners, as the amount of each quality of coal they shaU respec- tively send to the market. The ostensible design of this agreement has always been, so to regulate the supply in reference to the demand, that ruinous fluc- tuations should be avoided. This object has, perhaps been largely attained; at the same time, that its necessary tendency has been to keep up prices, by preventing competition; and since the opening of so many new collieries on the Wear and the Tees, the freedom of the vend is but littie, if at all, controulable by any such compact on the part of the large owners. In the second place, there is a regulation on the Tyne, authorised by Act of Parliament, and which requires that all ships coming into the river for coals shall be laden in turn ; the object being to prevent the giving a preference to particular ships ; so that when a vessel arrives, she is put upon the list, and comes on for a cargo accordingly. This ''Turn Act," which was renewed for twenty-one years, some years ago, has been complained of as causing the unnecessary detention of ships in the river, where it is estimated ten thousand arrive in the course of a single year : its influence, however, on the trade at Newcastle, has probably been, on the whole, beneficial hitherto.

The following are the charges on a cargo of coals from Newcastle to London, over and above the price paid to the coal owner. Tlie ship is 204 tons regis-

mVER AND COAST DUES. 371

tei*, holds thirteen keels and two chaldrons and is filled at the Spout on the Tyne : —

£ 8. B.

Coast Duty, Is. per cbaldron, 5 6 0

Tynemouth Light, id. per chaldron, and Is. added, 0 3 2

Low Light, (ship above 200 tons,) 0 2 7

Trinity Lights, lid. per ton, and 6d. added for Tees

buoy, 1 10 3

Coast Lights, 3d. per chaldron. 16 6

Bridlington Pier, id. per chaldron, 0 2 3

SfDarborough Pier, id., and 8d. for Old Pier, 0 6 1

Whitby Pier, id., 0 4 5

Night Office, Id. per keel,.. 0 12

Foy, 0 6 0

Stamp, 0 4 6

Town Daes on Coals, 2d. per chaldron, 0 17 8

Do. on ship and boat, 0 4 2

Trimming 3s. 6d. per keel, and 6d. each for two

chaldrons, 2 6 6

Cranage on Ballast, 45 tons at 6d. (filling 2d., cran- age 4d.) 1 2 6

Corporation Assessment on Ballast, at Is. 8d 3 15 0

Ballast at London : —

45TonsBallast, at Is 2 5 0

Heaving in, 12s. per score, 17 0

Booking, 0 1 0

£21 9 9 To the above must be added, — Spoutage, 6d. per chaldron. Keel Dues, 2s. 4d. Pilotage in and out, say £2. Steam Boat, £1. If the Ballast be delivered into keels, the charge per keel will be, for keel due and warrant, 24s., coasting, 14s.

For two keels and warrants, £3 16 0

For extra five tons, 0 10 0

4 6 0

Making a difference between delivering by crane and keels, of £3 69. 6d.

2 B 2

872 The London Coal Trade.

The annual bearing of these chaises upon a collier ship will depend, of course, upon the number of trips made : but supposing a vessel from the Tyne to make ten voyages in the year to London, (fifteen have been made,) the charge from Newcastle would amount to £214 17s. 6d. At Sunderland, many of the above charges do not exist; so that upon ten voyages from the latter port, the imposts are only £142 15s., — making a difference in the year of £72 2s. 6d. This is calculating the vessel as always delivering at Newcastle J whereas, were the ballast delivered into keels, it would make a farther differ- ence in the year of £31 15s. Od. It has, moreover, been asserted that, at Sunderland during the summer months, not one quarter of the vessels come into the harbour with ballast, but cast it at sea ; and in the winter months, not more than one half.

By an Act passed in 1807, the coal trade in London and Westminster, and in certain parts of the counties of Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, and Essex, (which had long been subject to regulation by law,) was, from the arrival of the vessel in the river Thames, to the ultimate delivery of the coal to the consumer, placed under a series of strict regulations, pursuing in minute detail every step of the business.

The following is a statement of the various charges upon a chaldron of coals in the port of London, as they were levied in 1830 : — Grovemment duty, 6s. j Orphan's duty, 6d. ; City metage, 4d. ; additional metage, 4d. j Deputy meters for wages or hire, (in discharging, per score of 21 chaldrons, 3s. 6d. ;) in lieu of samples and other charges, (£1 Is. per ship,)

47 Geo. III. by which eleren previmis Aeti were repealed, one as far back as Edward VL

Government And City Dues. 373

and for proTisions (calculated at 13s. 6d. per ship ; L e., 4k days at 3s. per day) collectively chat dron, 3id. ; coal heavers, or whippers, (nine for eveiy ship, 3s. per score of 20 chaldrons ;) meter's men, 3s. per score of do. ; and undertakers Id. per do.; together, per chaldron. Is. 7d. ; coal market duty. Id.; Lord Mayor for permit; night office; collector of water baillage; clerks of coal meter's office, and of coal market ; — these are rather custo- mary than legal items, and are charged upon each ship, making per chaldron H- ; tonnage duty, l|d.; Trinity and Nore light dues, kd* ; other charges, 4d. Total of charges, 9s. 4ki. per chaldron. There was a London duty of 3s. 4d. a chaldron taken off coals in 1824.

According to the above regulations, which remain- ed in force until 1831, all coal brought into the port of London was required to be sold on the coal ex- change. When a vessel arrived, her papers were

Some idea may be formed of the manner in wMch tlie business of the oMl market was trantaoted, prerions to 1797 from the foIlowiAg statemeat of Mr. GiUespj, an old coal Ihctor, in his eTidence before the Comnuma* Committee, in 1830. When I came on the market, in the year 177, it was a private building, owned by certain proprietors. It had been bnilt about seven years before that time : before the year 1768, the coal buyers used to congregate together, upon what was caUed Rome-land, an open place off Billingsgate, and when my father came on the market, in the year 1755, the practice was, for the factors and buyers to associate together among the fish people, and endeavour to make aa arrangement so as to make a purchase of coals. The Act of the 9th Anne, made it indispensable, that the captain should be a party to suck an agreement, and, therefore, whenever a factor could get one, two, three, or four buyers, who engaged to take a caigo of coals, he got them to a public-house in the neighbourhood; the first thing was to order something to eat and drink, the factor to pay for the room, and fhey sometimes concluded a bargain; at other times they parted without making a bargain, but the factor always paid the expenses, and thpy made a private bargain in the best way they could ; it followed, of course, at that time, that no coals were sold, unless the whole cargo could be disposed of: — the practice at that period was, that there was generally something of a con- cealed price that was kept back, so that the price avowed to the public was

374 The London Coal Trade.

transmitted to the factors employed in the coal mar- ket, certifying the name of the ship, the port to which she belonged the quantity and name of the coal she contained the price paid, and the name of the port of shipment The entry being made at the Custom House, the certificate was endorsed and filed by the receiver of the Lord Mayors dues, and a copy of it sent to the clerk of the coal market, by whom it was publicly exposed on a board provided on the exchange for that purpose. The factor might then proceed to the sale, which could take place only between the hours of twelve and two, on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The contracts were required to be entered in the factor's book, a copy was then given to the clerk of the market, after which the fitter's certi- ficate, together th a warrant and certificate of the king's and the city dues being paid, were delivered to the derk of the ship-meter's office, together with a turn paper, specifying the order of succession in which the different purchasers were to have their respective shares of the cargo delivered to them. After these forms were gone through, a ship meter was appointed to superintend the discharge of the cargo.

In October, 1831, an Act of Parliament was pass- ed, " For regulating the vend and delivery of coahs in the cities of London and Westminster, and in rtain parts of the counties of Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, Essex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and Berkshire." The basis of this Act, as set forth in the preamble is, that — the Acts theretofore in force,

more than was really paid. The practice was to return guineas reiy much ; one, twO| or eyen four guineas were sometimes given back."

2d Guiel. IV. cap. Ixxvi.

Parliamentary Regulations. 375

for regulating the vend and delivery of coals at the several places specified having been found insufficient to prevent the commission of fiauds and impositions in the vend and delivery of such coals, the objects intended to be effected by the said Acts would be more effectually promoted, while the rates and charges which tended to increase the price of coals might be reduced, if the said Act were repealed, and other provisions made in lieu thereof. The new Act, after repealing (from the termination of the year, 1831,) so much of the statute of 9th Anne, c. 28, as refers to the regulations detailed above, including also, por- tions of more recent Acts, substitutes a clause, re- quiring that every fitter or other person lading coals for the port of London, shall send a letter directed to the clerk of the coal market, and put into the general post-office, on the day on which the ship or vessel containing coals, shall sail on her voyage, or shall give to the ship-master, befcHre sailing, a certificate, signed by such fitter with date of lading, master and ship's name, quantity of coals on board, the usual names of the several and respective collieries out of which the said coals are, and shall be, wrought and gotten, and the price paid by the master for such coals/' Certain penalties attach to the intromission of false, or non-deliveiy of regular certificates, and an additional penalty of threepence per ton, when coals exceed the quantity mentioned in the fittei certificate, by 51bs. in lOOlbs.

Previous to the passing of the late Act, a compli- cated and expensive part of the machinery connected with carrying on the trade in London, consisted of the system of meterage, organised ostensibly for the protection of the public, and also to assist in the col- lection of various municipal and other dues.

376 The London Coal Trade.

Fifteen principal ship meters, and one hundred and fifty-eight deputy or working meters, whose number was, on the alteration of the law in the year 1824, increased from one hundred and eighteen, were appointed by the city of London. The prin- cipal meters superintended the deputy or working meters, whose duty it was to ascertain and certify the quantity of coal measured out of the ship ; and each deputy meter appointed an assistant, who worked with him in the delivery of the cargo. In order to effect this object, a yessel called a vat, containing nine bushels, was placed on the deck ; it was filled from a basket in which the coal was raised from the hold, and was deemed to be frill when a regular cone, twelve inches high, was formed on the top ; the vat was then emptied over the ship*s side into the barge, which barge was divided into compartments or rooms, as they were called, holding usually either ten or five chaldrons, pool measure. According to the quantities thus ascertained by the ship meter, not only the public dues and duties were paid, but also the freight, and price agreed for by the persons who had purchased the cargo calculated. It was also the duty of the ship meter to transmit an account of the quan- tity of coal measured from the ship to the ship meter's office, to the clerk of the coal market, and to the office of the principal land meter.

The cargoes of coal ships have long been almost exclusively delivered by persons called whippers, usually provided by undertakers — the latter, too often connected with publicans and shopkeepers, and whose practice has been to compel the gangs of men whom they choose to employ, to purchase liquor and goods

t*ool measure is one fourth of a chaldron extra on every xe chaldrons.

Meterage And Delivery. 377

of those persons upon very disadvantageous terms — a whipper, whose pay was regnlated by the Act often being compelled to pay two shillings a-day for gin or beer whether he drank it or not. The barges employed were usually the property of the coal mer- chants, and were not subject to any particular regu- lations. It is provided, however, by the Waterman's Act, that no person shall navte such barges on the Thames who is not a freeman of that Company. When the coal reached the Merchants' Wharf, the superintendence devolved on a different class of persons, also legally appointed. Neither the coal merchant nor the buyer had any controul over the measurement of the coal ; this was entrusted by law to the land meters : of these persons, there were four divisions ; one in the city of London ; one in West, minster ; one in parts of Middlesex ; and a fourth in the county of Surrey. It is to be observed, however, that parts of the metropolis within the county of Kent, and the principal part of the Regent's Canal, were free from any such controul. The land meters were entitled to sixpence a chaldron for all coal sold by wharf measure, and one shilling for every five chaldrons sold by pool measure. It was the duty of these persons to superintend the actual measurement of all coal removed from the barge ; to see the bushel properly filled, and three bushels placed in each sack before it was carried away. In the sacks, thus filled, it was directed by the then existing law, that all coal should be delivered to the consumers.

To persons yiaiting London ttom the coontiy, few objects have appeared more striking than the waggons and horses of the cosl dealers. Gay, in his Trivia," alludes to the bulk and number of Ihoae teams, which in his time blocked up the streets :—

" Wliere the fair columns of St. Clement stand, Whose straitened bounds encroach upon the Strand ;

378 The London Coal Trade.

The coal bushel was a metal cylinder, inches diameter inside, 71 inch deep ; and in filling it, the coals were to be heaped six inches high in the mid- dle, so that a line drawn from the apex to opposite sides of the bushel, would be 111 inches in each direction. It will readily be peiceived how, in mea- suring such a commodity as coal, the quantity called a bushel must in reality frequently vary much ; not only as it might happen to be of a larger or smaller kind, but according to the management of the meter; for although by the use of a sort of strike called a triangle, the cone of small coal might be pretty accu- rately estimated, yet when the commodity consisted of large irregular shaped pieces, the case was widely different. In the delivery of coal to the public, a bushel measure was required to be sent with each waggon, and the purchaser was by law entitled to require any one sack to be measured ; if that were found deficient, he was then at liberty to send for a land meter, and to require the remainder to be mea- sured in his presence. A very laige proportion of the inhabitants of the Metropolis, however, derived no benefit from a regulation involving such unpleasant details, where doubt was entertained, — and which,

Foiih iifuing from tteep luies, fhe collier steeds

Drag the blaok load ; saother cart succeeds ;

Team follows team, crowds heaped on crowds appear.

And wait impatient till &e roads grow clear." The horses of the coUiers," says Leigh Hant, are worth nodoe at all times from the magnificence of their build." Southey has noticed the men : The most singular figures in the streets of the Metropolis," says he, '' are the men who are employed in carrying the earth-coal, which they remoTo from the barge to the waggon, and again from the waggon to the house upon their backs. The back of the coat, therefore, is as well quilted as the cotton breast-plate of out soldiers in America in old times; and to protect it still more, the broad flap of the hat lies flat upon the shoulders. The head con> sequently seems to bend unusually forward, and the whole figure has the appearance of having been bowed beneath habitual burdens."

Parliamentary Committees. 379

besides, afforded no protection to purchasers of less than nine bushels. The poor especially were exposed to hardy if not to fraudulent, dealing, without redress, as they mostly buy coal from chandlers and other small retailers, and in these purchases the meter was not authorised to interfere.

Such had been the progress, and such were the existing regulations of this important branch of our national commerce in 1830, when a Select Com* mittee of the House of Commons was appointed '' to enquire into the State of the Coal Trade, in the Port of London, with respect to the several Acts and regu- lations affecting the vend and delivery of coals within the Cities of London and Westminster and Liberties thereof, and in certain ports of Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, and Essex : and also to enquire into the price and charges of coal to the port of London, and at the port of shipment, and whether any and what restric- tions exist with regard to the supply of coal," &c. In pursuance of these authoritative instructions, the Committee examined a number of persons connected with every department of the enquiry j from fliese individuals, they derived an ample body of evidence, which, with the report founded thereon, was ordered to be printed : from this report several of the foregoing particulars are derived.

It was the opinion of the Committee in the first place, that the sum of 13s. Od. usually added by the merchant to the price of coal in the river, to cover expenses, would be reduced, if the merchant were allowed to conduct his business with less restraint; the interference of the land meters producing a de- gree of delay to which the advantages derived from them did not appear to be at all equivalent : indeed,

380 The London Coal Trade.

besides the inconvenient delay in the discharging of Tesselsy and the iiregnlaiity of the metage as ma- naged in different places, or by different parties at the same place, it was shown in evidence that, in one district at least, three-fourths of the coal went away without being measured by the meter.'' The Com- mittee, therefore, on the ground that the expense and inconvenience produced by the system of land metage were not compensated by any security to the public, gave it as their opinion diat, if coal were to be deli- vered by weight, and every facility were afforded to the purchaser for seeing it weighed, the public would be considerably benefited. The Committee were likewise of opinion, that the system which the law had provided for the discharge of coal firom the col- liers into the barges, was altogether defective ; not only did they deem the allowance made by law to the whippers, amounting to 38. for each score of twenty chaldrons, to be much higher than the current market price of labour; but they demonstrated that much abuse had arisen in the distribution of such excess. As all the witnesses concurred in stating, that in ports which were free from these regulations, the dis- charge of the cargo was much more economically conducted, the Committee recommended the reped of the existing regulations in this respect, leaving the ownere to provide their own means of unloading their vessels.

It appeared in evidence, that the total payments made to ship meters, assistants, and whippers, on 1,503,581 chaldrons imported in 7,031 ships, in the year 1829, were as follows : —

Meters, £33,690 19 4

Meters* Men, 11,95117 0

Whippers, 107,666 13 6

Breakage To Increase Bulk. 381

As these payments appeared to be unnecessarily large, the Committee considered whether the ship as weU as the land meters could not be altogether dis* pensed with ; they were, however, of opinion, that as a sum of about £90,000 is collected annually by the city of London under yarious trusts, the continuance of the meters for that purpose might be desirable ; and moreoTor, that so long as they continued to be so employed, they should also be employed in ascer- taining and charging the King's duty. The Com- mittee, however, considered it of the utmost impor- tance, not only that a change should be made in the mode in which the business of the ship meter was conducted, but that some adjustment or modification of port dues should, if possible, be effected. As a reason for this recommendation, they referred to the apparent difference between the number of chaldrons of coal shipped and the quantity actually delivered. This strDdng feet was illustrated by the result of twentytwo cargoes of the same coal, carried in five ships, making together so many voyages. The ave- rage of these cargoes proved that the Newcastle chaldron, as put on board, made out in the pool eight per cent, more than the double chaldron (of two London for one Newcastle) ; or than a keel of coals of eight Newcastle chaldrons.

That the system of breakage notoriously carried on widi all sorts of coal, both during the voyage and afterwards, for the purpose of increasing the bulk,

Captain Cocbrane, one of the owners of Hetton CoUieiy, stated on Ms examinsdon before the Committee of the House of Lords, that 'Mt is hj no means vnoommon to see the bojs in the hold, breaking the coals with ham- mers as Ihey are shipped; thej are again," he adds, broken when thej come to London, for the purpose ot getting an excess of measure." He mentions an instance where the breakage made a difference of 90 chaldrons in S3,

382 The London Coal Trade.

should have been reluctantly acknowledged, was what might have been expected : but it was surpii- sing that some persons should gravely have professed to doubt whether coals broken into small pieces really did occupy more space than before It is probable, indeed, that in every instance, the excess of Lcmdon pool over Newcastle measure was not so great as it appears to have been with respect to the above-men- tioned cargoes ; but it is a well-known fact, and pro- bably not better known to any persons than those in the trade, that coal occupies considerably more space when broken than when solid. The accuracy of the late Dr. Button's statement on this subject, was con- firmed to the Committee by Mr. Buddie. " K one coal," says Dr. Button, " measuring exactly a cubic yard (nearly equal to five bolls), be broken into pieces of a moderate size, it will measure seven bolls and a half; if broken very small, it will measure nine bolls." There was no part of the trade, from its earliest stage to the last sale to the consumer, which was not affected by the inducement to break the coal in order to increase the measure. And so far was the screening of the coals which had previ- ously taken place at the pit mouth, with such im-

Another specioof otjectiom niged agaiiiBt the sale of ooaU by weigbl on the part of those interested in the retention of the breakage system was, that the weight would be increased by wetting, and thus the public would be cheated. But, as Mr. Edington, in a Treatise on the Coal Trade pub- lished soTeral years ago, remarked, the contrazy is more likely to be tho case; for if a bushel of Wallsend coals be measured up dry, it will shew its weight to be from eighty-four to eighty-five pounds : then try another bushel of the same coals well wetted— the weight will be found not so great; for the fact is, a bushel of dry coals, if ever so round, has always a part small, which runs like dry sand, and fills up cavities, making the whole a soUd mass; whereas a bushel of wet coals only doses up the hollow cavity, and ihey clog together and will not weigh so much as the dry oools."— TVeottM, pp. 191-193, and 200.

Sale By Weight. 883

mense waste, from being of any iiltiinate advantage to the consumer, that Mr. Brandling, in his evidence, declared the coals were reduced to a state, before they were delivered to the retailers, inferior in point of size to what they would have been if put on board unscreened.

In reconunendiiig 80 considerable a change as the substitution of weight instead of measure, throughout the whole of the London coal trade, ii was necessary to consider the interests of individuals, as they might be affected by any mode which should be adopted in charging the duty. With that view, the Connnittee not only examined evidence, but caused experiments to be made, as to the specific gravity of different sorts of coals. It was the opinion of some witnesses, that the increase of weight which might be given to coals by wetting them, would open a source of fraud, little if at all inferior to that complained of from uncertain, meterage. It was obvious, however, as well from the nature of the substance, as from various trials, that large coals would sustain but little moisture com- paratively ; and, moreover, that watering could not take place to any considerable extent, upon either large or small, without its effect being very apparent : whereas, in measuring, the strictest surveillance often failed altogether to protect the purchaser. As to the gravity of different coals, the Committee found no such difference in the varieties raised in Durham and Northumberland, as to render weight an unfair cri- terion between them : and the result of experiments as to the average weight of a chaldron of coals as delivered in the port of London, led to the conclusion, that if the chaldron was taken at 25- cwt., and the charges made on a ton in the proportion of 20 to 25,

384 The London Coal Trade.

or 4s. 8H to 6s., the benefit of whatever error might exist Tfould be given to the public.

Having given the foregoing brief abstract of the voluminous evidence laid before Parliament, pending the contemplated alterations in the laws ajSecting the coal trade, it remains to be mentioned that, in pur- suance of the recommendations of the Committees of both Houses, the sale of coals, culm, and cinders by measure, was abolished within all ports of the dties of London and Westminster by the Act of 1831 before adverted to. This Act likewise abolished in the same places, the office of land coal-meter ; at the same time, authorising the Corporation of London to pay, out of the funds placed at their disposal, such compensation to the parties removed, for the loss of their situations, as the said authorities should think proper ; including the continuation of annmties to such superannuated meters as might have been so provided for previous to the passing of the Act

The corporation funds adverted to, will arise as follows : the metse jurisdiction of the city autho- rities, anciently granted to them as conservators of the river Thames, is suspended for seven yea j meanwhile, the Act of 1831, gives them a duty of twelvepence per ton on all coal, culm, and cinders, brought into the port of London, to be applied for the purposes set forth in former Acts. The claims of the Corporation to dues for groundage and water baillage, are also suspended for seven years. Inland coals brought into London by the Grand Junction or Paddington Canals, pay tibdrteenpence duty addi- tional, instead of fifteenpence as formerly.

As the new regulation required that all contracts, existing at the time the Act took effect, although

Whippers And Lightermen. 385

-€Utered into with reference to the old system of measure should be fnlfiUed by the substitution of a delivery by weight, it was enaxted that, for such purpose, twenty*fiye hundred weight, and the half of another hunted weight/' should be considered and laken as equivalent to one chaldron*

By the aforesaid Act, the Coal Exchange, (which is stated to have cost £60,000), with its site, build* ings, and appurtenances, vested in the Corporation of London by the Act 47th Geo. Ill*, is to continue 80 vested. It is, moreover, declared to be a free and open market for the sale of coals brought into the port of London, and is to be denominated the Coal Market/* Its government and sustentation are dei- ficribed by the Statute. A duty of one penny per ton on coals, culm, and cinders, arriving within any part of the port of London, or westward of Gravesend, is authorised to be levied for defraying the expenses of the Coal Market, &c.

In reference to the removal of coals from ships in the Thames, although the work is not absolutely thrown open to whomsoever will do it best and cheapest, the sphere of competition is considerably enlarged : lightermen are allowed to enter into part- nership with woodmongers, coal dealers, and others, as carriers of coals, provided such co-partners as are

The coal ships in the Thames are delivered, as already stated, by alass 4>( men called Whippers," who were formerly paid at the fixed rate of three hillings for twenty chaldrons : they have sometimes been known to deliyer AS many as 205 chaldrons in a day, on extraordinaiy occasions : they could, faoweTer, work 105 with ease. They consist in great part of Irishmen ; and aince the new regnlations hare somewhat opened this department of the coal irade on the river, competition has been the consequence,— certain gangs being willing to deliver ships at a penny per ton, while others demand fiva farthings. Frequent disputes and conflicts ensue; and the Police Magi- strates are frequently called upon to maintain the peace between these penny and ye farthing men, as they are called.

386 The London Coal Trade.

not lightennen, do not enter into the business of con- veying in lighters, barges, or other craft, for hire, any description of goods whatever, except only such coals as may be lightered by them in their trade of coal dealers. When the quantity of coal exceeds five hundred and sixty pounds, a ticket is given by the seller, specifying the sort of coal contracted for, the number of sacks, weight of each sack, &c. These sacks are required to contain either one hundred and twelve pounds, or two hundred and twenty-four pounds net — except when the coals are delivered by what is called ''gang labour," when the quantity contained in the sacks is left undetermined. The late Act also authorises the delivery of coals in bulk, provided that the weight of the cart or other carriage, as well as that of the coals, be correctly ascertained, by a weighing machine erected for that purpose on the wharf, so that the carman can be made clearly J

responsible for the delivery of the specified weight, under a penalty, to be levied according to the amount of any deficiency that may be discovered.

Every carman, taking out coals for sale, is required to have a weighing machine, (previously proved and marked at Guildhall), attached to his carriage,* and with it, the carman is required to weigh any sack or

In 1831, the large silver medal oi the Society of Arts, was ren to Braby, for a machine for weighing coals in sacks. This contrivance con- sisted simply of a horizontal bar of iron prcjeeting behind the waggon, and parallel with the aides, to one of which it is fastened. Upon a hook at the end of this bar is suspended a steelyard, having at one end a scale which hangs by four chains from a top-board for the reception of the sack, and at the other end a pendant weight, which will connteipoise two hmidred weight in the scale. Bnt as a sack of coals weighs something more than two hu- dred weight, this excess is ascertained by means of a small moveable weighty which slides along the graduated lever-aim : it also serves, when the coals are poured out, to ascertain the weight of the empty sack — thus giving the exact weight of the commodity to a quarter of a pound.

Progressive Increase. 887

sacks upon delivery to his customers : this weighing to take place in the presence of a constable if the purchaser chooses to call one. Stationarj weighing machines are also erected in convenient situations; and no quantity less than 660 pounds of coals is allowed to be sold and delivered without being weighed*

While recognising the great improvement which has been effected in the London coal trade by the substitution of the steelyard for the bushel it must not be imagined by persons little conversant with the subject, that the sale of coals by weight was on the coming into operation of the Act so often adverted to> absolutely a new thing on the banks of the Thames; for the fact is, that the practices both of measuring and weighing obtained at once, early in the seven- teenth century ; and a charter of 12th James I. to the Corporation of London, recites that his Majesty had given to the Mayor, and Commonalty, and Citizens, and their successors, the weighing of all and singular coals, called stone coals, pit coals, earth coals, and all other kinds weighable, of what kind nature, and species soever."

Some idea of the extent of this trade may be derived from the following statement : — In 1826, the amount of coal, culm, and cinders, imported into the port of London, was 1,600,229 chaldrons equal to 2,040,291 tons, 25- cwt. being reckoned a chaldron, as required by the late Act. At that time, the duty paid upon the coal and dnders, was six shillings per chaldron, and upon the culm sixpence; — the entire importation produced £467,852. In 1830, the importation was so nearly on a par with that of 1826, that there was only the difference of about £100, in the amount of

388 The London Coal Trade.

duty paid. From the Ist of March, 1881, these daties were repealed; and in the following year, (1832,} the total quantity of the above descriptiona of fuel imported at London, was 1,677,708 chaldrons, or 2,139,078 tons, the amount of the preceding twelye- months. In 1833, the quantity of coals stated to have been sold in the London coal market, was 2,006,653 tons, of which the proportion of Stewart's Hetton, and Lambton*s WaUsend — the sorts considered best for ordinary purposes — was about 604,605 tons. The price of delivering these sorts at the cellar of the consumer, seems to have been 26s. per ton.

Another account makes the amount much larger. According to a return lately made to the House of Commons, the quantity of coals brought coastwise and by inland navigation into the port of London, in 1833 was 2,014,804i tons, and 1834, 2,080,547 tons. Of these, there came from Newcastle, in 1833, 1,060,830 tons; in 1834, 1,142,003 tons; from Sun. derland, in 1833, 666,787 tons; in 1834, 550,105 tons. From Stockton, in 1833, 170,600 tons, in 1834, 64,268. From Hull, Goole, Gainsbrough and other places in Yorkshire, in 1835, 17,751 tons. At present, the current London prices are — best Stewart's Hetton, or Lambton's WaUsend, 20s. per ton ; best Newcastle, 27s., second, from 25s. to 27s.

Chapter Xx-

Irish, Scotch, And Welsh Coal

Trade.

Importation ofCoaU into Ireland — Dublin supplied from Whitehaven — Various Coal ports — Legislative Regulations — Sales by Weight and by Measure — Coals aUowed to be imported duty free for certain Manufactories — Scotland behind England in the methods ofroorlci/ng Collieries — Coed taken to Scot- land dutyfree — Sold by Weight — Scotch Coal sent coastwise — South Welsh Trade — Newport — Small Coaly or Ctdm — Coal Balls.

XRELAND, although containing within itself strata of bituminous coal, and, especially, a vast deposit of anthracite at Kilkenny, imports a large quantity of the former description of fuel from various parts of Great Britain. Tlie principal sources of supply are Whitehaven, in Cumberland ; Ayrshire, in Scotland ; and South Wales. The city of Dublin is chiefly supplied from Whitehaven; the exports from the latter place to Ireland having been, in the year 1828, upwards of 186,000 imperial chaldrons; in addition to 16,328 chaldrons from Newcastle; 44,856 tons from Liverpool; and 13,250 tons from Lancaster.

390 Irish Scotch And Welsh Coal Trade.

The importation from Scotland during the same year was 105933 chaldrons. The Welsh coals are ship- ped for Ireland mostly from Newport, Cardiff, and Chester; and amounted in 1828, to 142,738 tons, exclusive of upwards of 20,000 tons of culm. In addition to the consumption in Dublin, great quanti- ties of coal are brought to the Irish ports of Cork, Belfast, Waterford, Newry, Wexford, Drogheda, Dundalk, Limerick, Londonderry, Sligo, Galway, Westport, Coleraine, and Baltimore ; the relative im- portance of these places, in regard to the coal-trade of Ireland being according to the above order of enu- meration. The total amount of coals imported into Ireland, in the year 1828, was 777,575 tons.

Coals for the above ports from Wales have long been put on board by weight : to ascertain this exactiy, the waggons, previously weighed while empty, and marked, are, when full, run upon a machine placed in the line of the railway for the purpose, so that the weight of the contents of each can be immediately ascertained. Considerable inconvenience having for- merly arisen from the manner in which the coal trade was carried on in Ireland, and particularly in Dublin, I

a succession of statutes, commencing with the reign of Queen Anne, had been obtained for more effectually preventing the engrossing andregrating of coals, and also for preventing abuses in consequence of combi- nations to raise the price of the commodity. These statutes were repealed by an Act passed in 1832, with the exception, that the impost of one shilling per ton, upon all coal and culm landed within the city of Cork, is continued.

As one great source of fraud and litigation had been the substitution of a superior denomination in

Sale Of Coals In Dublin. 391

lieu of the proper name upon inferior descriptions of coaly espedallj in reference to that taken firom White* hayen, the last Act requires, that on a conspicuous part of eveiy vessel, in which coals shall be publicly offered for sale in any port, harbour, or river in Ireland, there shall be affixed a board or label painted with the reputed name, or commonly received denomina- tion of the coals ; and also the name of the port from which the cargo has been brought, together with the prices at which the coals are offered for sale ; in de- fault of a compliance with which regulation, a penalty often pounds is incurred.

Coals, which were formerly sold in Dublin by measure, as latterly in England, and under the super- intendence of authorised meters, as well for the pro- tection of the public, as to fietcilitate die collection of certain dues, have for many years been mostly sold, and the city duty of Is. Od. per ton, charged by weight; a small steelyard being for this purpose placed on the deck of the ship. The validity of sales, how- ever, was made to depend upon the presence of the officer, until the passing of the Act of 2 Will. IV. rendered the employment of licensed meters and weigh-masters optional on the part of buyers and sellers, who were declared to be at liberty to employ whomsoever they might think fit, in connexion with sale, measurement, weighing, delivery, or storage. Six months aft the passing of the above-mentioned Act, another was passed, giving compensation to the coal-meters according to certain specified terms ; for which object, fourpence per ton is levied upon all coals, not Irish, brought into the city of Dublin, and no vessel is allowed to discharge her cargo until the duty is paid. These duties which are but tempo-

392 Irish Scotch And Welsh Coal Trade.

rary, may be reduced as the annuitant meters die off, or accept certain situations of emolument ; and they are finally to detennine and cease altogether, when there shall remain no longer any claimant according to the statute. But, pending that issue, there is a clause exempting from the aforesaid duty of fonrpence per ton, all coals imported into Dublin, for the hana fide use of the glass, sugar, and salt manufacturers, and for the use of distillers, brewers, calico-printers, iron, brass, and metal founders ; paper, woollen, and linen manufacturers ; dyers, chemical workers, and all other coals required for the use of manufactories. For these purposes, the consumption is very conside- rable, while in private houses, especially in situations remote from the capital, this valuable fuel is much too expensive to become common. It will, however, be recoUected, that in addition to native and imported coal, Ireland is abundantly supplied with peat, which, not only is the common fuel of the poor, and indeed of all classes, in some districts, but it is also brought in barges by the grand canal and consumed to a great amount, along with, or instead of coal in the capital itself.

Scotland, as already stated, contains vast deposits of various kiuds of coal ; but, notwiUistanding this fuel has been worked in that country for a period of five or six hundred years,* the drawing and pumping machines, no less than the underground arrangements, were until lately in every respect much behind those of our English collieries : even the system of tubbing back the water by the erection of a sheathing of tim-

The first mention of coal that occure in any charter relative to Scotland, occurs in a grant, executed in the year 1291, in favour of the Abbot and Convent of Dunfermlinci and the privilege of digging coal in the lands of Ftttencrieff, in the county of Fife.

Scotland. 393

ber inside the shaft, a practice almost unirersal in the Northumberland collieries, was only introduced a few years ago. The introduction of cast-iron tubbing, which is at once so durable and conTenient, was first effected by Mr. M. Dunn, at Preston Grange Colliery, near Edinburgh, in 1830. This gentleman was also the first to introduce the practice of tubbing into Ire* land, he having applied it for the first time in the sinking of one of the Castle Comer pits in the county of Kilkenny, where a plank sheathing of ten fathom long, supported by inside cribs, accomplished the winning of a tract of coal, without that method unat- tainable.

The consumption of coal, cuhn, or cinders in Scot- land is not burdened with any duty, as tlie commodity is both imported and carried coastwise without restrict tion ; a drawback being allowed upon all coal re-ship- ped for Scotland from any port in which it may previously have paid the duty. This circumstance, while it gives to the country all the advantages of an open trade, at the same time brings the Newcastle traders into direct competition with the Scotch colliers almost at the very mouth of their pits.

Edinburgh is mostly supplied with good coal, as- similating to the English in quality, from pits in the neighbourhood ; especially from the collieries of Lord Elgin. The coals were formerly sold by measure in the city, but fraudulent tricks being common, and complaints consequently arising, as in the sister capitals, the Magistrates resolved that they should be sold by weight, and to facilitate this object, they established steelyard weighing machines at conve-

Mr. Dann re€eired in 1832, the first silver medal of the Edinburgh So- ciety of ArtS) for the application of cast-iron tubbing in Scotland.

394 Irish, Scotch, And Welsh Coal Trade.

nient corners of the streets, where any person may have his purchase weighed* The waggoner who takes the coals, receives a ticket from the coal agent specifying the weight of the load; and if a pur- chaser chooses to have it weighed at any of the ma- climes, and finds it short of the quantily charged, the carman is liable to make good the deficiency. Coals are likewise sold by weight in the city of Glasgow, which is well supplied from the collieries of tlie Duke of Hamilton, Mrs. Dixon, and a great number of others, in the immediate district In 1828, there was shipped firom Scotland and sent coastwise to va- rious parts of Great Britain, 233,338 tons of coal ; to Ireland, as we have already seen, 40,295 tons; to the British Colonies, 18,635 tons; to other foreign countries, 13,305 tons, making a total of 305,573 tons. During the same year, the quantity of coals imported at the following places collectively, viz. :— Leith, Dundee, Montrose and Arbroadi, Banff, Greenock, Aberdeen, Kirkaldy, Inverness, Grange- mouth, Thurso, Dumfries, Irvine, Lerwick, Stomo- way, Kirkwall, Port Glasgow, Borrowstoness, Stran- raer, and Campbeltown, amounted to 283,059 tons, charged by weight ; to which has to be added 194,109 chaldrons, sold by measure.

The immense size and vast contents of the great Welsh coal basin, have been previously adverted to. From that all but inexhaustible depository, prodigious quantities of the various kinds of coal are sent to dif- ferent parts of the United Kingdom : the working of collieries having amazingly increased of late years, owing in great part to the extended advantages of canals, and rail or tram roads. Mr. Coffin stated in 1829, that twenty years previous, there were hardly

South Wales. 395

any coals shipped in Newport — perhaps not a thou- sand tons in the course of the year ; whereas, at the period named, the shipment amounted, collectivelj in that port alone, to nearly fifteen hundred tons a day.

There is, as already intimated, an extensive trade in coal carried on between South Wales and Ireland. The ports of shipment are principally Cardiff and Newport, Swansea and Neath ; and the vessels used, are generally firom 120 to 200 tons burthen. The quantity sent from the former of these ports in 1829, has been stated at about 60,000 tons ; and from the others, at about 550,000 tons. Newport enjoys an exemption from the duty of four shillings per ton collected upon Welsh coal shipped from every other part of the Principality. This advantage was given during the reign of George the Third, by an Act which declares all vessels going to the eastward of the Holmes, (two islands in the Channel), to be duty free. As this regulation gives almost the ex- clusive benefit of the Welsh coal trade between Bridgewater and Bristol, to Newport, the shippers of Cardiff, whose harbour is only excluded by falling about half-a-mile on the wrong side of the line drawn from the Holmes, loudly complain of the preference : at the same time characterising it as a clause slipped into the Monmouthshire Canal Act.*'

The exemption from duty here alluded to, had the effect of opening up coals at a greater distance from the market than otherwise they might have been — the Newport coals travelling, on an average, from twelve to fift;een miles by the tram-roads : they are consequently considered to be dearer than coals that have only to be carried half that distance to the ship- ping port, by the amount of such extra haulage and

390 Irish Scotch And Welsh Coal Trade.

tonnage ; the consumer having sometimes had to pay six shillings a ton at Newport, when the same might have been purchased at Ljdney for 3s. 6d. In refe- rence to this matter, David Mushett, Esq., a well known iron and coal master of Gloucestershire, stated, in his evidence before a Committee of the House of Lords in 1830, that, while at Ljdnej, the small coal was required to pass through a three-eighths of an inch riddle, Newport shipped it without either riddling or duty in the markets within the Severn. The ports of Swansea and Neath, which are not within the Severn, were permitted, it was alledged, and con- trary to regulation, to ship all their small coal at the lower duty, and subject nominally to a two-inch riddle, though seldom enforced, even of this laige size. The coal here alluded to is not only small, but considered to be of a very inferior quality. Mr. Mushett says, that in 1828, not a single ton of that description was sold at Lydney, whereas there was shipped during the same year at Swansea, upwards of fifty thousand tons of small coals, nominally subject to a two-inch screen ; not a binding coal, but a firee burning coal. It was shipped under the de- nomination of bastard culm ; it is in an intermediate state between stone coal and bituminous coal; it bums easily, with a little flame, but does not adhere much together. In the same year, the stone coal culm exported from Swansea was upwards of sixty- four thousand tons : it is chiefly used in the furnaces of steam-engines, and for smelting. When these coals firom the Welsh ports are shipped for foreign markets, the owners of the vessels are obliged to enter into a bond that the vessel shall proceed to the port for which it is cleared out. Stone coal culm.

Coal Balls. 397

from its slow combustion and the long steady heat it is capable of affording, is well adapted for lime bam- ing, and large quantities are exported for that purpose : mixed with clay so as to form balls, it is also used in Wales for domestic purposes. In the cottages of the peasantry in the counties of Glamorgan and Carmar- then, and more especially in Pembrokeshire, these balls form the principal article of iueL The culm and clay, being first thoroughly mixed by the bare feet of one or other of the female part of the family, are moulded into balls of an oval shape, and the good housewives not unfrequently display their taste by the fanciful way in which they place these balls edge* wise in the grate, each row being inclined at a differ- ent angle ; and, under the active influence of that passion for whitewashing, (which extendiDg from the church belfry to the pig-sty, adds very materially to the picturesque nature of Welsh scenery,) they are not unfrequently, together with the bars of the grate whitewashed also. These balls are, as may readily be supposed, difficult to ignite, but being once lighted, bum for a great length of time, and being renewed at the top as they slowly consume, the fire is not allowed to go out, in some cases, for many years ; such a catastrophe would, indeed, be regarded by a thrifiy housewife, as an unlucky omen. The appear- ance presented by a fire of this description, with various articles of linen hung up to dry, absolutely in the chimney, (for the balls, like stone coal, emit neither smoke nor flame,) is not a little singar to any one accustomed to the bleezing ingles," and black diamonds'' of the North of England.

Forater's ObBerratioxiB on the South Welsh Coal Basin, in Trans. New- casae Nat Hist Soc. toI. 1, p. 94.

Chapter Xxi.

Conversion And Products Op Coal.

Manufacture of Toys !fc. from Glance Coal, Camul i/' Coal, and Jet — Pulverised Coal — Copperas — Bv- tuminous Products of Coal — Pitch Lake-— Early Eaperiments on Mineral Tar — Natural Fountains of Gas — Earl of DundonahTs Patent — The Dis tilkUion of Coal — First exhibition of Artificial Gas — Manufactured for purposes of lUumination — Residual Matters — Ammoniaml lAquor and Coal Tar — Incineration of Coal — Hard and Soft Coke — Processes of Preparation — Branching Coal — Smoke, Soot, and Ashes.

L HE more direct conversion of coal in substance, into a yaiielj of articles, has been already mentioned in a previous Chapter : it need, therefore, only be repeated here, that while glance coal is, in some countries, largely appropriated to the formation of i . trinkets, as cannel coal is in our own, it is to the ' depositories of jet, the most perfect of the lignites, and ,' itself a species of coal, that the English artist is in- ! debted for the material most highly prized as a; substitute for black amber. This substance, of un-j doubted ligneous origin, is frequently met with in

'J 1

Decomposition Of Coal. 399

the sandstotie rock about Whitby and Scarbrougli, from whence it is sent to London and BinDingham : it occurs in pieces of Tarious sizes, and is valuaUe according to its quality. There is an immense block of beautiful jet from the former of the above localities, in the Museum at Newcastle. When of fine grain, it yields freely to the file, and to the tools of the turner; and vast quantities of it are annually con- sumed in the manufacturing of beads, crucifixes, brooches, boxes, and other personal ornaments and toys.

Coal, in a pulverized state, is an article of com- merce, there being a manufactory of coal and coke dust at Wigan, in Lancashire : and it is said of the celebrated John Gait, that in early life, he read many books on astrology, alchemy, and witchcraft; and firom the study of such occult subiects, he seems to We imbibed Le ,tnu.ge notion! wbicb bi. ,eng sense has not altogether eradicated. Hie only useful " ' result of his study of the black arts, was the appro- ' priate discovery, that coal pounded to an impalpable ., powder, makes an imperishable black. Gait hints, that this might have turned out a profitable specula* tion, had he pursued it : and he generously promul- gates it for the benefit of modem practitioners of the black arts, wheth in ink, blacking, or paint-making.

If we take a lump of coal, of a certain description, and expose it for a time to the influence of moisture — say to the rain, and then evaporate the liquid in which it has lain, we shall obtain sulphate of iron, or green vitriol. If the coal be next submitted to a strong heat in an iron retort, and the frime which arises be passed through water, the obviously resulting products will be hydrogen gas and coal tar, — the former seri-

400 Conversion And Products Of Coal.

form and highly inflammable, the latter a black odorous liquid. Having yielded these matters, the contents of the retort will have taken that form known by the name of coke.

The above is descfiplive, not of merely laboratory experiments, but of economical processes, which are every day carried on in the conversion or analysis of coal, on a large scale. In the laboratory of nature, as well as in the crucible of the experimenter, not only these, but various other products are eliminated.

Although we have assumed that from one lump of coal, the above-mentioned results might be derived — which, indeed, would not be an extraordinary case — it will be obvious, nevertheless, that certain sorts must be more or less adapted for particular purposes, according to their composition.

At Newcastle-upon-Tyne, as well as in other col- liery districts, martial pyrites are often found mixed with the coal in such abundance, as to render the latter unsaleable for fuel ; but persons are employed to pick out these brassy coals," as they are called, and remove them to a proper place where, in process of time, they become acidified and fit for the produc* lion of green vitriol.

The iron contained in the martial pyrites is in a metallic state, and combined with sulphur. The su per-sulphuret of iron in this mineral, is converted into sulphate of iron at the great copperas works, by ex* posing the pyritical coals to the air and rain for several months in large beds prepared for the purpose. The sulphur decomposes the water which falls upon the beds, and is itself converted thereby into sul- phuric acid, which combining with the iron forms the salt in question ; and this is afterwards extracted

Petroleum. 401

from the mass by lixiviation and crystallization. There are several places where green vitriol is thus procured, in the neighbourhood of Newcastle ; and the process is carried qn upon a large scale at Dept- ford, near London. Beautiful natural crysta s of this salt are occasionally met with : pieces of green vi- triol used to be collected in great abundance from crevices in the pillars of the deserted coal-works at Howgill, near Whitehaven: this substance is also found shooting from pyrites of iron in the vicinity of the coal in other places.

We have elsewhere adverted to the tendency of iron pyrites to originate spontaneous combustion, when mixed with bituminous coal in a comminuted state : this, however, only takes place where the mass is exposed to the free action of the atmosphere ; and there seems no reason to suppose such a phenomenon occurs in the depths of the mine, where air is ex- cluded, and the materials are in situ— though a dif- ferent opinion formerly obtained. Klaproth believed that the Carlsbad waters were heated by a large bed of coal, set on fire by iron pyrites, and that iron py- rites, coal limestone, and salt springs were the raw piaterials out of which Nature elaborated the hot mi- neral waters — an hypothesis now exploded, as Jame- son observes, both on geognostical and chemical grounds.

The elaboration of petroleum or mineral oil, which has been found in nearly all the countries of the globe, varying from the finest Persian naphtha, through all the gradations of the white, reddish brown, and bkck rock oil, to the impure earthy pitch, has been usually ascribed to some subterranean process of charring

Parkaa. 2 D

,r

402 Cojntyersion And Products Of Coal.

and combustion undergone bj the coal in its natural deposit. There is, however, some disagreement be- tween chemical authorities in their conclusions re- specting the probable origin of naphtha — one indivi- dual discovering in its composition products indicative of destructive distillation, and another obtaining re- sults similar to those yielded by oil of turpentine, a product of vegetable life separated at a comparatively low temperature. From a series of investigations on Persian and commercial naphthas, by Dr. Gregory, the results of which were laid before the Royal Society of Edinburgh, that gentleman concludes, diat if both descriptions experimented upon were genuine, there must be at least two kinds of naphthas-one, a pro- duct of destructive distillation, the other the oil of turpentine of the pine forests of which our coal fields are formed, separated by a gentle heat, either before or after their conversion into coal. Dr. Reichenbach, who has recently succeeded in obtaining pure petro- leum from coal by artificial distillation, considers that our mineral coal is nothing but the turpentine oil of the pines of former ages, which have been converted into coal. Petroleum wells he considers to be feeble distillations of large beds of coal, and produced by the universal subterranean heat of the globe.

There are three varieties of bitumen, which appear like the rock oils in different stages of issitude or induration : — 1. Earthy bitumen, which does not occur in this country : at a place called Puy de la Lege, in France, it is so viscid that it adheres strongly to the foot of the traveller. It is found in the East, in Persia, and elsewhere, and is used for plasters as pitch is used in this country, and also as a coarse varnish.

Jameson's Edin. Phil. Jonni. 1834. p. 376.

Mineral Pitch.

]

% Elastic bitumen, or mineral caoutchouc, so called from its resemblance to the common Indian rubber, and some of the properties of which it possesses. It is found in the Odin Mine at Castleton, Derbyshire and in the coal mines at Montrelaie, in France, at the depth of thirty-five fathoms, where it is of a blacker brown colour than from Derbyshire. 3. Compact bitumen, or asphalt It is found in the Palatinate, in France ; at Neufchatel, in Switzerland ; in large strata at Aolona, in Albania ; and in large pieces on the shores, or floating on the surface of the Asphaltic Lake, in Judea, called the Dead Sea. It abounds in the islands of Barbadoes and Trinidad, in the West Indies. In the latter, it occurs in a vast lake, three miles in circumference, called the Pitch Lake; the thickness of which is unknown. A gentle heat ren- ders it ductile, and when mixed with grease or com- mon pitch, it is used for paying the bottom of ships. Bitumen enters into the composition of the black in- durated shales which accompany common coals : it is

Our latest accoants of the Fitch Lake are those giren by Webster in the descripdon of his royage; from this nayigator it appears that the pitch, fill- ing as it does, a cavity half-a-mile in length. Is a dall black solid substance, breaking with an even ftactore, ea/" Imdgjth a knife, and emitting

run like common pitch — from whf It is used in mending the roads at water; it has also been employed the ground to a considerable exte the contents of a pitch barrel hi Tegetadon thrives luxuriantly, th/ particularly good. It is curious is here condensed, not only seed to invert the usual theoiy, whici .

JDys the

bonaceous matter. It is not na poses that the coal formation originally in the same state hypothecs ''which would ten/ angmalous appearances.'* It' are primordials, and do not rei

procure

Cficturers, and Sstfd in England.**

that in the coal

y 404 CONVERSION AND PRODUCTS OF COAL.

also the colouring matter in certain species of lime- stone or black marble. Hatchetine, a black wax-like substance occurring in the veins among the ironstone at Merthyr Tydvil, in South Wales, appears to be a peculiar species of bitumen.

Mellite, Retinasphalt, and fossil copal, are sub- stances commonly found in connexion with bitumi- nised wood ; they have been supposed to be vegetable resins, changed by the process of mineralization, to which the latter have been subjected : or bearing a similar relation to the matter of the lignites from whence they may possibly have exuded, that the true bitumens do to the carbonaceous deposits from which they are derived, and which owe to them their different degress of inflammability.

The foregoing are substances eliquated by nature, for the most part in profound obscurity, but probably from coal seams ; products, some of a similar and others of a different composition, are constantly ex- hibited by art. The most common of these is the coal tar of our gas-works. The manufacture of this liquid on a large scale, and with a commercial object, long preceded the idea of applying the inflammable vapour so abundantly evolved during the process, for purposes of illumination. In a work published at Frankfort in 1683, by John Joachim Becher, he says, "in Hol- land there is turf, and in England there are coals, neither of which are good for burning, either in apart- ments or smelting-houses. I have, however, disco- vered a method of burning both these to good coals so that they shall not only produce no smoke or bad smelly but yield as strong a heat for melting metals as that of wood, and throfm out stick flames, that afoot of coal shcM make afUxme ten feet Zowjr." Here we

%

Natural And Artificial Gas. 405

hove not only the idea, but an actual description of the phenomenon produced by a common gas appara tus. The author proceeds : — " This I have demon- strated at the Hague with turf, and proved here in England with coals, in the presence of Mr. Boyle, by experiments made at Windsor on a large scale. It deserves to be remarked on this occasion, that as the Sweedes procure their tar from fir wood, I have procured tar from coals, which is in every thing equal to the Sweedish, and even superior to it for some purposes. I have tried it both on timber and ropes, and it has been found excellent. The King himself [Charles II.] ordered a proof of it to be made in his presence. This is a thing of very great importance to the English ; and the coals, after the tar has been extracted from them, are better for use than before." y We now come to one of the most beautiful as well as useful discoveries of modem times — the application of coal gas as a substitute for oil and candles in the illumination of streets and apartments. An expres- sion of wonder almost necessarily escapes from the person who hears of the above experiment, and re- collects, at the same time, the previously well-known phenomenon of the "burning well" at Brosely, that the artificial application of coal for such purposes should not sooner have been sigested. The tre- mendous exhibitions of this agent in our coal mines, were but little calculated to lead to such a result ; and to this day, no economical advantage is taken of it.t

Beckman's Hist InTentions, toL i, p. 339. '<At present,'* says the tmulator of Beckmany In 1798, the burning of coals in order to procure from them rock oil, used particularly by the leather manufacturers, and which on that account must not be exported, is much practised in England.**

f It appears very remarkable,** observes Mr. Lyell, that in the coal

406 Conversion And Products Of Coal.

Gaseous exhalations are common in different parts of the world — in Tndia Persia, Chinay &c. There are some of these natural gas vents in China which have been burning for centuries, and are turned to economical account Beds of coal, though at a great depth, are frequently pierced bj the borers for salt water, and from the wells thus made the inflammable vapour springs up : it sometimes appears as a jet of fire from twenty to thirty feet high, and in the neigh- bourhood of Thsee-Iieon-Teing, the salt-works were formerly heated and lighted by means of these foun- tains of fire. Bamboo pipes carry the gas itofaa the spring to the place where it is intended to be con- sumed. These tubes are terminated by tubes of pipeclay, to prevent their being burnt. A single well heats more than three hundred kettles. The fire thus obtained is said to be so exceedingly brisk, that (he cauldrons are rendered useless in a few months. Other bamboos conduct the gas intended for lighting the streets and the great rooms or kitchens. Thus, Nature presents, in this place, a complete establishment of gas light. As the whole of the gas cannot be employed, the excess is conducted beyond the limits of the salt-works, and there forms three chimneys or columns of flame,*

In America, several fountains of inflammable va- pour have been discovered. The village of Fredonia,

districts of the British Isles, where such a laige unoimt of carbaretted hy- drogen is annually produced, means have not been adopted for making an economical use ot this gas, both as respects light and heat"— <?o/<iytMi Mmwal, p, 152. In illustration of the circumstance alluded to by Mr. Lyell, may be mentioned the striking but unnoticed fact, that ten times as much gas is evolred annually by the waste pipe at Wallsend, described in a prerions Chapter, as is manuftbctured by the Sheffield Gas Work's Company, for the illumination of that laige town.

Edin. Phil. Joum. 1830.

%-

Earl Of Dundonald'S Patent. 407

in the State of New York is lighted b j a natural discharge of gas which is collected by means of a pipe into a gasometer. The quantity obtained is about eighty cubic feet in twelve hours. It is carburetted hydrogen, and is supposed to be derived from beds of bituminous coal. The same gas is discharged in mudi larger quantities in the bed of a stream about a mile from the village.

The extraction of tar from pit coal was mentioned,

as we have seen above, so early as the year 1683

The process wae, at an after period, carried on with a

commercial object in the neighbourhood of Newcastle,

by a Baron Van Hacke, who died at Gateshead in

1 780, having been brought over from Silesia for the

purpose of managing the works at the above place.

In 1781, a patent was granted to the Earl of Dun-

jdonald for 'a method of extracting or making tar,

. pitch, essential oils, volatile alkali, mineral acids, salts,

and cinders, from pit coals." So much importance

was attached to this patent, that the usual term of

fourteen years was afterwards extended by Act of

Parliament, to twenty years, from June 1, 1785.

Here we have distillations of coal, made on the large scale, for almost eveiy purpose, except the pro- duction of gas for illunnnation : to the evolution of which, all the matters regarded as of most importance by the above-mentioned projectors, are at present considered to be only subor(Unate. That a perma? nently elastic and inflammable aeriform fluid is evolved from pit-coal appears to have been first ascertained by a Rev. Dr. Clayton, an account of whose discovery was published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, for 1 739. Subse- quent chemists exhibited the gas in their experiments ;

/

408 Conversion And Products Of Coal.

but the credit of having divulged the notion of turn- ing it to practically useful purposes has been disputed between the partizans of Mr. Murdoch and Mr. Winsor. The former individual, while residing at Cornwall in 1792, commenced a series of experiments, in the course of which " he remarked/' says Dr. Henry,* that the gas obtained by distillation from coal, peat, wood, and other inflammable substances, burnt with great brilliancy upon being set fire to ; and it occur- red to him, that by confining and conducting it through tubes, it might be employed as an economical substi- tute for lamps and candles.'' In 1 798, Mr. Murdoch constructed an apparatus at the Soho Foundry in Ayrshire, which was applied during many nights to the lighting of the building ; and in 1802, an illumi- nation of the manufactory, in honour of the Peace, afforded an opportunity of making a public display of the new lights.

In the years 1803 and 1804, the general nature of gas-light illumination was exhibited by Mr. Winsor, at the Lyceum Theatre in London ; but the apparatus, by the means of which he obtained the coal gas, and the mode of purification which he adopted, were kept secret. Such, however, was the brilliancy of his lights, and the publicity given to the hypothesis of illumination thus exhibited and recom- mended, that establishments for lighting apartments and streets with coal-gas, almost immediately fol- lowed.

It would be out of place in this work, to do more than allude to this most important product of pit coal : elaborate descriptions of the various methods of dis- tillation, purification, conduction, and biuming of

Thompson's Chemistry.

Gas Works* 409

coal-gas, adopted at the establisBmehts throughout the country, will be found in works appropriated to the subject. Briefly, it may be stated that, in prac tice, bituminous coal is distilled in large closed cylin- drical retorts, placed side by side in a nearly hori- zontal position over heating furnaces, to produce de- composition of the coal. The gross fiime hence eTolved by the application of heat consists, besides the carburetted hydrogen, of an aqueous ammoniacal vapour, a thick fluid resembling tar,f and some non- inflammable gases. The separation of these products is effected by first condensing the vapour in pipes laid through a cold water-tank, and then passing it through dr quick lime, lime in solution, or red-hot cylinders, by which means the gross matter is pre- cipitated, while the gas is carried onward in a purified state to the gasometer, from which it is distributed by service pipes for use. The best coals for gas are, generally speaking, those that yield the largest amount of bituminous products, and are at the same time, free from dirt and sulphur : some of these kinds, however, yield so spongy and worthless a description

This liqaor, on being sulgected to chemical proceades, is made to yield lulphate of ammonia, (the sal ammoniac of the shops) ; and carbonate of ammonia, (common pungent smelling salts) ; also Prnssian bine, &c.

f In some places this product is a troahlesome commodity on the hands of the makers of gas, as while it cannot be sold, the law forbids it to be poored out on account of the noisome stench which it yields : it has been known to be run into the old workings of a colliery by hogsheads at a time. It may, however, be re-distilled for gas, yielding nearly twice as much as the same weight of coals; but during the process so great a deposit of carbon takes place, that the retort presently becomes useless, and hence, it is not used. As Itiel, it might be burnt under certain circumstances ; its heating powers, however, according to Br. Baubeny, are not greater than good coaL The liquid bomt in the newly invented Naphtha Petroleum Lamps," ia understood to be a distilled product of coal tar ; it is also used for effecting the solution of caoutohouc, as used in saturating the celebrated water-proof cloths; and likewise for several kinds of varnish.

410 CONVERSIOli AND PRODUCTS OF COAL.

of coke, that in places where the cinder is of consi* derable Talue, some sacrifice of direct productiTeness in the yield of gas for the sake of superiority in the carbonaceous residuum is preferred. One pound of good coal will yield four cubic feet of gas. The coke or carbonaceous base of the coal remaining, after dis- tillation, in the retort, varies from 25 to 50 per cent as compared with the original amount. Coke is an important product of the gas works, and is sometimes sold for more than the original cost of the coal.

Besides the enormous amount of coal consumed for various manufacturing purposes in the same state in which the article is supplied for firing in general, there is also a vast quantity prepared and sold in the .

state of coke or cinders. This indeed is the condi- (

tion in which the fuel is used at most of the smelting establishments, as well as for a great variety of pur- poses connected with the working of metals. The cinders commonly made are of two sorts — hard cokes or those in which the bituminous quality has been completely exhausted ; and sqfi cokes, or those which having been but partially burnt, retain some degree of inflammability : the terms hard and soft, however, as thus used, have reference rather to the methods of coking, than to the absolute quality of the products — for the hard cokes are much softer, and the soft cokes considerably harder, as the coals from which they are made partake more or less of these characteristics. The methods of preparation pursued with reference to both sorts are so accurately described by Parkes in his Chemical Catechism," that most subsequent writers have satisfied themselves with transcribing his account.

The hard cokes are prepared by subjecting the coal

Cokes Or Cinders. 411

to a certain degree of toirification, in a sort of fiimace called a coke-oven. Although the identical ovens described by Mr. Parkes as near Sheffield no longer exist, there are a great number of others, within a few miles of the town, from which the various manu- factures are supplied, and the construction of which is exactly similar to the fonner. Each oven is a cir- cular building, ten feet in diameter within, and the floor laid either with fire-brick squares, or with com- mon brick set edgeways. The wall of the oven rises about two feet perpendicularly above the floor, and the whole is then covered with a brick arch or dome, which rises three feet six inches more, forming a cone whose base is ten feet, and whose apex is two feet, if measured within. This opening of two feet at the top, is left for the convenience of supplying the oven with coal, and to serve as a chimney during the pro- cess. The whole height of the building, from the floor, is about six feet ; and the wall, which is eighteen inches in thickness, is built with good bricks, well and closely laid, that no air may get in through any part of the work.

The floor is elevated three feet above the ground, for the convenience of placing an iron barrow under the door-way to receive the coke as it is raked from the oven. When the oven is thus finished, a strong perpendicular wall of common unhewn stone is usually thrown round it, of about two feet in thick- ness, and carried up the whole height of the oven, forming a complete square. The four comers be- tween the circular bmldiug and these outward walls are then filled with soil or rubbishy which is well rammed in to give greater firmness to the work, and more efiectually to exclude atmospheric air. These

412 Conversion And Products Of Coal.

ovens are generally arranged six or eight in a row, either against the side of a hill, or in a mound of earth artificially raised to a level with the top, for the convenience of shooting the coals in at the aperture ; the doors, or openings in fi*ont, are level with die inner floor*

When these ovens are once heated, the work goes on night and day without interruption, and without any other expense of fuel. It is conducted thus : — Small refuse coal, of good quality, is thrown in at the circular opening at the top in quantity suflicient to fill the oven to the springing of the arch ; this charge is then levelled with an iron rake, and the door-way built up with loose bricks. The heat which the oven acquires in a former operation is always sufficient of itself to light up the new charge ; the combustion of which is accelerated by the atmospheric air, that rushes in through the joints of the loose bricks in the door- way. In two or three hours, the combustion gets to such a height, that the attendant finds it necessary to check the influx of the atmo- spheric air : the door is, therefore, now plastered up with a mixture of wet soil and sand, except the top row of bricks, which is left unplastered all night. Next morning, (when the charge has been in the oven twenty-four hours) this row is completely closed also ; but tihie chimney remains open till the flame is gone, which is generally quite off* in twelve hours more : this aperture is then covered with a few loose stones, upon which is heaped a quantity of sand or earth. All connexion with the atmosphere is now cut ofi*, and in this condition the whole remains for twelve hours more, to complete the operation. The door-way in front is then opened, and the cokes,

Hard And Soft Cokes. 413

which appear in large rhomboidal pieces, having a fonn similar to that presented by starch, are raked out into iron wheelbarrows, or low waggons, to be carted away. The whole operation takes up forty- eight hours ; and as soon as the cokes are removed, the ovens are again filled with coal for another burn- ing: about two tons are put in for each charge. The cokes thus produced are, as lust stated, venr large, ponderous, extremely hard, of a Ught graj colour, very sonorous, and shine with a metalUc lustre, appearing very different in this respect from those commonly produced by the burning of whatever description of coal under ordinary circumstances. They are used in the smelting of iron ore, in the steel casting furnaces, and in various manufactures that require an intense and long continued heat. Cokes of a similar quality are produced without the aid of ovens by piling large coals in long heaps about three feet wide, two feet high, and ten yards in length: the row being lighted by the application of burning dnders, and the access of atmospherical air regu- lated, and finally excluded, by covering up the mass with sand and ashes : in the conversion by this pro- cess, the fiiel loses about half its weight.

When coke is required to be more of the nature of charcoal, the process is conducted in a different man- ner. If small coal be used, it is thrown into a large receptacle, similar to a baker's oven, built of brick, with a tall wide chimney to throw off the smoke, and previously brought to a red heat. Here the door is kept constantly open, because the heat of the oven is of itself sufficient to dissipate the bitumen of the coals, the disengagement of which is promoted by frequently

Chemical Catechism, p. 453, edit 1B22.

414 Conversion And Products Of Coal.

stirring the coal with a long iron rake : water is also occasionally thrown upon the mass during combustion. Hie coke made by this method though the same kind of coal be used, is very different from that produced by the former operation : this being intensely black, very porous, and as light as pumice-stone. It is used for a variety of purposes ; but when intended for the iron and steel forges, great care must be taken that the coal shall be free from all heterogeneous mixtures, especially sulphur and pyrites.

Hie appearances presented by different descriptions of coal when passing into the state of coke, has already been intimated by the terms open-buminff and caking: in both kinds, the process of incineration ends in yielding a residuum of ashes, — but the different effects of fire upon them are extraordinary; the pieces of coal, in the one instance, igniting and consuming, almost as independendy as so many lumps of wood ; and in the other, not only coagulating, but as it were, tomi- fying and expanding, somewhat in the manner of borax when exposed to heaL One of the free-burn- ing coals of South Wales is remarkable for the swelling or branching which takes place during combustion, and in the process of coking, which is effected in the open air. This arborescent appearance, so different from that which takes place in other bituminous coals under similar circumstances, had led to the local term, G16 spagod or branching coal. In some varieties (from the Clyngwemon seam, for instance,) this property exerts such an effect on the coke as to make it nearly as light and porous as wood charcoal.

In every instance where coals are burnt, there are two products evolved of a most obvious character, or

Smoke, Soot, And Ashes. 415

rather the same product presented nnder two condi- tions, smoke and soot, — the former, turned to no profitable account, the latter of some value in agri- culture and the arts. Were it possible,'' says Peckstone,* to collect the dense smoke thrown out by burning coals, deprive it of its combustible parts, and condense it, it might perhaps be applied to the purpose of generating artificial light.'' This object, however, has not been attempted. Soot, derived from the combustion of pit coal, yields, according to Sir H. Davy, in addition to the charcoal which forms its basis, certain proportions of volatile salts, extractive matter, and an empeurematic oil : to these it owes its efficacy in certain cases, as a manure, being chiefly used in top-dressing some descriptions of land. It may be added, that the ashes of pit coal are used about London in admixture with clay in the making of bricks ; and in the northern counties generally, as forming with the night soil, a valuable agricultural compost. Thus, we see, that not only is this fuel of inestimable value for the direct purposes of affording light and heat, but also in a variety of other ways ; that even its very refuse is converted by the skill of the chemist, or the industry of the labourer, to eco- nomical and other uses.

History of Gas Lighting, p. 40.

Chapter Xxii-

Home Consumption.

Extent of Home Consumption — Importance of Coal in the generation of Steam — Steam Engines — Ma- nufactures of Earthenware and Glass — Statements of Mr. PeUatt — Gas Works — Iroti Works — Con- sumption of Coal in Sheffield — Manchester — Bvr- mingham — Leeds — Liverpool — London — Consump- tion in the United Kingdom — Tkr on Coals or Hearths proposed — Waste of Coal at the ColUeries.

JLT would be uninteresting, if not impossible, to spe cifj all the circumstances under which coals for the purposes of fuel are applied in this country; and while it would be an hopeless attempt to ascertain the exact quantity consumed in any given section of the United Kingdom, it were almost equally futile to pretend to estimate with precision the whole amount which may be burned in Great Britain and Ireland in the course of a year. Some details, how- ever, in addition to what has been already stated, as being strikingly illustrative of the importance of this fuel in particular instances, may be given ; and also a few of those general statements which, from the data upon which they are founded, must be acknow*.

Steam Engines. 417

ledged to be worthj of credit : die fonner class of fiiets will shew how largely partieular branches — in- deed all the important branches — of our national in- dostrj are dependent upon constant snppUes from those immense magazines so fortunately treasured op within our reach ; and the latter may beget or increase the conviction that, comparatiTely inex- haustible as our mines may be considered, such proofs 6f an expenditure of their contents as are here ex- hibited, call for a vigilant prevention of all unneces- sary waste.

In addition to what may be termed the direct uses of coal, which will be mfore pBurticilIarly noticed in the present Chapter, there is an important item uhder the head of Home Consumption, for what might with- out impropriety be called an indirect use of the fuel, — namely, its expenditure in the generation of power, by converting water into vapour. This is an extremely iAteiesting feature of the hbtoiy of coal, regarded as an dement in our national capabilities : and when speaking of industrM resourcefl- the part which, by the economied conversion of her abundsiAt argilla- ceote carbonates of iron into cannon. Great Britain was enabled to take, for good or for evil, in the late wars of Europe; and of the agency of steam, in emdblin us to undersell the world in our niainufac- tores, and to giroW rich, despite a national debt of eight hundred milfions sterling, — wheu speakii% on these, aikd similar subjects, the easential consequence of our commodious, and all but exHaustless coUieries, is not always sufficiently taken hkto the account; At a time when such sangtdne, not to say chimerical expeeta; tbns are indulged, relative to siekaa fffejects, and when experiments on a splencBd aiid apensiive scale

2£

418 Home Consumption.

are actually iu operation, it ib impossible not to regard with new interest a fossil, which, little more than a centmy ago, was regarded merely as an accessory to domestic comfort and convenience, but which has now not only become indispensible in our manufacturing arrangements, but is looked to as a material agent in bringing as it were nearer together, for commeicial purposes, the remotest nations of the globe.

Of the aggregate power of the steain engines at esent in work throughout Great Britain, we have no specific account — therefore no means of compering accurately the consumption of fuel with the resulting effect. In 1827, the immense steam engines erected by Captain Grose, in ComwaU, were raising upwards of sixty-one milhons of pounds one foot high, by the consumption of a single bushel of coal : and since then, it has been stated, that owing to the more effec- tive worldly of steam, on what is tenned the ex- .pansive principle,'' tiiat quantity of fuel is made to raise eightyseven millions of pounds one foot high! That, however, is a ratio far above the average result; 55,T)00,000 lbs. lifted one foot high by each bushel of coals consumed, will be nearer the actual result in practice. In 1832, there were sixty-four steam en- gines in Cornwall, four of them tiie hrgest ever made : at that time, the consumption of coal at these engines was 84,000 bushels per months or 2,800 per day ; the .effect of the steam generated by the combustion of this fuel in draining the mines, wus reckoned to be equal to the work of 44,000 horses. Some esti- mate of the advantages derived to our inland and coast navigation, in consequence of the facility and economy with which coal is obtained for the generai-* tion of steam on board vessels, may be formed from

Earthenware And Glass. 419

the fact, that in July, 1835, there were, including forty-six then building, five hundred and twenty-seven steam vessels of different sizes, belonging to ports in Great Britain. Of this number, three hundred and ninety*.seven were registered of the burthen, collec- tively, of 36,849 tons.

Exclusive of the British iron works, which will presently be mentioned, there are two branches of our home trade, both of them of great importance, from the number of men to whom they give constant employment, and in some sort resembling each other in their object of converting materials, otherwise of small value, into rich and even precious commodities — the manufactures of earthenware and glass : both these fruitful branches of local industry owe their flourishing condition mainly to the abundance and cheapness of good coal. Pottery works are, indeed, of very ancient standing in this as in moat other countries where the argillaceous earths occur j but it is only just without the memory of man, that their establishment on a splendid scale has conferred cele- brity upon one of our noted coal districts. It was to the presence of appropriate fuel for the furnace, no less than to the discovery of plastic materials for the wheel, that this country has been indebted for the Wedgewood may be almost said to have created : and among the advantages of the pottery trade enu, merated by that patriotic individual during his exa* mination before the Privy Conndl in 1 785, was the great number of people employed in the extensive collieries for its use. We have, however, no iedfie account of the quantity of coals consumed in this manufacture ; tibough it has been stated that one of

2e2

490 Home Con8C7Mption.

the lai ovens or kilns, in wluch tlie Staffordsbaie wares are baked, consomes, at a single firii, from tirelve to fifteen tons of coal.

Glass makers are said to haye been bnmgbt from FVance to tins country so early as a.d. 674 : but the art made little progress amongst us, previously to 1557, when a manu&ctoiy of the finer sorts waa established at Crutched-Friars, in London and m century afterwards, ffint glass, considered little infe- rior to that imported from Venice, was made in the Savoy-House, in the Strand, and presently also at Lambeth, under the patronage of the Duke of Buck- ingham. As eaily as about 1619, the neighbourhood of excdlent coal, and the discovery of its ajylicati< in the making of glass, attracted this manufacture to the banks of the Tyne, where it was begun by Sir Robert ManseU, Knt Vice-Admiral of England, and has ever since flourished. In the year 1635, King Charles, by his proclamation, prohiUted ihe importa- tion of any sort of glass from foreign parts, duiing the term granted by Eong James to Sir Robert Man- seU, for the sole making of that commodily : in this proclamation it is set forth, that Sir Robert MauseD had by his industry and great etsqpense perfected that manufrcture, with seaxMl or pit-coal, whereby not only the woods and timber of this kingdom are greatly preserved, but the making of all kinds of glass is established here, to the saving of much treasure at home, and the employment of gat num- bers of oipr peojde.* The tsanaitaon from the use of wood fiiel to pit-coal was not effected in tiie glass any more than in the iron trade, without serious losses to the first adventurers, though lliey were not so numerous. The patentee above name4 stated

Glass Anp Gas Wqrks. 421

to hae melted vast Bums of money in this business'* -Hso much 80 indeed) Hiat King James is reported to have said, ''that he wondered Robin Mansell, being a seaman, whereby he got so much honour, should fall from water to tamper with fire, which are two contrary elements/'

Mr. Pellatt, a celebrated metropolitan glass manu- facturer, informs us, that about twelve pounds weight of Newcastle coal is required to manufacture one pound of flint glass; and that when coala sold in London at about 38 shillings the chaldron, and the glass at fourteen pence a pound, the advantages of a manufacturer at the pit mouth might be about three fiirthmgii a pound over tliose of the London manu- ftctuier. Contrary to what might perhaps have been expected, coal is found to b6 the best fuel for making the finer descriptions of glass, as wood is for the com- moner kinds. The latter description of firing, which is commonly used by the French and Germans, b not known in the British glass-houses ; although Mr. Pellatt says, that some yedrs ago, wh flie prices of coals were very )ag\ &e terms upom which Beech logs could <lien have been obtained horn Henley, Uxbridge, and other places, led him seriously to think about adopting the Continental method, the greatest objection to the experiment being the cajatal already laid out in fumaoes adapted to the consumption of coal, and which would have required considerable alteration previous to tlie trial of wood fud. It was irtated three or four years since, that in the town of Leith, the glass-houses alone ccMurumed 40000 tons of coal annually ! Bearing in mind the statement of Mr. Pellatt above mentioned, some conception of the immense expenditure of coals for fuel in the manu-

422 Home Consumption.

faciure of glass, may be formed, when it is known, on the authority of official returns, that during the year 1832 one hundred glass-houses in the United Kingdom, produced upwards of 24,453 tons of glassy including the ditferent sortsi

An important item in the consumption of coals presents itself in the manufacture of gas : a com- modity formerly not known in our domestic ccnnmeice, but now produced on a large scale in most of the large and many of the smaller towns of the kingdom : of the number or extent of these gasworks we are not informed. Mr. Lowe, superintendent of two of the Chartered Gas Company's EstaUishments in London, once stated that the coal imported by that body alone, in the year 1830, was about 40,000 Im- perial chaldrons. And in 1834, it was stated by Mr. Brand, in a lecture at the Royal Institution, that for the total supply of gas to the metropolis, there are required 200,000 chaldrons of coals, yielding 3,400,000,000 cubic feet of gas ; the gas weighing 75)000,000 lbs. The light thus produced was stated to be equal to 160,000,000 lbs* of mould candles, of six to the lb. ; the bulk of the coal being equal to 10,800,000 cubic feet, or 400,000 cubic yards.

The quantity of coals consumed at the various iron works in this hingdom is enormous. The quantity of iron annually manufactured in Wales has been calculated at about 270,000 tons. Of this quantity a proportion of about threefourths is made into bars, and one-fourth sold as pigs and castings. The quantity of coal required for its manufacture on the average of the whole, including that used by engines, workmen, &c., will be about 5i tons for each ton of iron ; the annual consumption of coal by the iron

Sheffield — Manchester.

Torks will, therefore, be about 1,500,000 tons. The entity used in the smelting of copper ore, im i;ed from ComwaD, in the manufacture of tin plate, Ibrging of iron for various purposes, and for domestic uses, may be calculated at 350,000, which makes altogether the annual consumption of coal in Wales 1,850,000 tons. The annual quantity of iron manufactured in Great Britain is stated to be about 690,000 tons, in the working of which, if we assume the ratio furnished by Wales, there will be consumed about 5,550,000 tons of coal yearly.

It may not be uninteresting to introduce in this place, a few details relative to the sources and modes of supply at three or four principal towns. In Shef- field, besides the coal consumed in large quantities by the steam endues, gas works, and for manufacturing purposes, the steel converters and melters use a vast amount of hard and soft coke, which is mostly pre- pared in the manner previously described, in situa- tions near the pits a short distance from the town. The oldest pits are in a south-eastwardly direction from the town, namely, about the Manor, the Intake, and Birley — these places being respectively at dis- tances of two, three, and four miles. The coals are mostiy carried in one-horse carts, each containing about seven corves in measure, or one ton by weight ; a surprising number of these vehicles being constantly thus employed on the Park road. Considerable quan- tities of coal and coke have of late years been brought into the town by canal on the north side, ftm the collieries about Rotherham, those on Attercliffe and Tinsley commons, and still more plentifully by the self-acting waggon or tram road, previously described, from the Low Manor pit, belonging to a company who

424 HOM£ CQHSVlfPTION.

ue understood to be realicang immense profits by tlieir various coal works in the neigfabovuliood, leased from the Duke of Norfolk. TUs company alone supplies to the town 169,000 tons of coal per amimn. There are some other inferior sources of supplj mostly hdd by independeit proprietors. The jces of honsld coal, which is generally a mixture of hard, small or deck, and round or eohhUngSy is about 7s. 6d. per ton, including leading to the middl? of the town; prices at the pits yarying according to the distanee. The strong dear hard kinds used by tibe anvil men, is much dearer; commonly about ISs. or 16s. per ton, when laid down : this, for the purpose of heating the steel rods forged into the various articles of Sheffield ware, is ordinarily burnt into a sort of soft black coke by the workmen, (m the smithy hearth, previously to use.

The immwse consumption of coal in the large manufacturing town of Mandiester, is supplied, — 1. fix>m sources extending almost from the town itself to near Bokon, a distance of about eight miles ; — 2. from Woorsley, seven or eight miles pff; — 3- frow pits lying between Manchester and Cttdham; — 4. from others, between Manchester md Ashtgn ;— 5. some portion from the Rochdale side of tipue town ; — and 6. many of the best opals from Wigan. The prices for the small and hard kinds, respectively, as delivered in Manchester, are from Qs. 8d. to 1(. and 126. per ton. The Act of Parliament for the Manchester and Liverpool Railway, with a view to obviate the incon- venience of the smoke raised by pit coeA, enforces &e exclusive use of coke which increases the expense of fuel about 40 per cent, for the use of the locomotive engines.

Binxungham is supplied with coals from Tipfam, Oldbuiy, Bilston West Biomwieb Wednesbmy, and Dudley ; the greatest quantity coming from West Bromwich, and the best qualities from Wednesbuiy. It is chiefly brought to the town by the Biimingham caual, though some portion is carted in by small pro prietors : carts are likewise employed in distributing the commodity from the different wharfs. Manuibc* tones are supplied at from 6s. to 10s. per ton; smiihs at 17s.; and families in geneval from Os. to 12b., a<:cording to quality.

The following intesting particulars relative to the working of the pits about Leeds, and from which the supplies of that important town are derired have been kindly iiunished by an intelligent friend con* versant with the details ; — TheRev. R.IL BrandUing's pits at Middleton are three in number. 1. Day Hole, the entrance of which is on the side of a hill, and a subterraneous passage, of a very connderaUe length, is traversed, prior to the arriving at the draw- ing shaft. There are three qualities of coal ; first, that which is called De Coal, and lies at the depth of one hundred and sixty or one hundred and seveity yards below the surfBuce. The second quality is called IMHe Coal, which is got about forty yards bdow the top : these coals are not se bright as the deep coal, but they bum longer, and, consequently, are much used for engines, dye-houses, &c. lUie third quaUty is what is called, in Yorkshire, Sleek, being very small, and used principally kr funaces, fonndries, and the hearths of black and whitesmiths, &c.— 2.and8. llivsemdihe Venture and West Pits; the coals from them aw considered dnxable, but leave a quantity of white sediment or ash in burning.

426 Home Consumption.

These coals were first brought to Leeds under an Act of Parliament, obtained in the jear 17545 >&d wete distributed for nse through the town, at the Staitl called Casson's Close, being the site upon which the South Market now stands. Another Act was obtained in 1803, and the coals are now deposited at what is called the (Hd Staith, a little nearer Hunsl and Pottery Field than the South Market The mode of oonvejance to the town was by an iron railway, fanned under the above Act of Parliament; the coals were dragged along, untQ recently, from Mid- dleton, by a locomotive engine, which usually drew thirty-six waggons at one time. Two men having been killed by the bursting of the engine, the coals are now brought by horse power, one horse drawing six waggons. The deep coal is sold at the Staith at 16s. per wan, containing twenty-four corves, and warranted to weigh forty-five cwt. The little coal, in which there is a slight admixture of metallic matter, is sold at 9s. per waggon, and weighs full heavier. Sleek is sold at 6s. per waggon. Two-thirds of the coals sold are of the first of the qualities mentioned. By the Act of Parliament, Mr. Brandling is bound to deliver (if demanded,) sixty-eight waggons per diem, at the Staith in Leeds, and twelve upon Hunslet Moor; but the average number of waggon loads transmitted per diem, is from one hundred to one hundred and twenty in number.

Thorp Hall Collieries may next be mentioned* Although the soil in the neighbourhood of Thorp Hall belongs to Lady Gordon, who recently succeed- ed to the possession of the estates of the late Mar- chioness of Hertford, the coals are the property of William Fenton, Esq. There are seven or eight pits

Collieries At Leeds. 427

l>elougiBg to this gentleman. The coals bum very bright and hot bat are very swiftly consumed. At Thorp Hall, as at Middleton, there are three kinds of coal, which is sold at the following rates : — The deep coal at lis. per waggon, weighing thirty-four cwt. each ; litde coal at 8s. per waggon, same weight; sleek of same weight, at 5s. per waggon. Some of these pits have been open nineteen years. . Thoip Hall is about two miles and a half from Leeds, on the east side of the river Aire, and the coals are brought in vessels to the Waterloo Staith near the Old Church.

Rothwell Haigh Colliery comprises three pits of the best deep coal, which is sold at two shillingps per tip- pler'-each tippler weighing about 5i- cwt. A coal of inferior quality, called little or top coaly and which is procured at a depth of one hundred yards, is sold at one shilling and four pence the tippler. The coals are sold at Crown Point Staith, being a few hundred yards nearer the Old Church than the Waterloo Staith. These coals are considered of a very superior quality, being bright, ardent, and durable. The Middleton coals are nearly of the same quality ; but at Rothwell Haigh, about six inches of coal at the bottom of the bed, as it leaves in burning much sedi* ment, is left in the ground. The prindpal diflference betwixt the deep coal of Middleton and that of Roth- well Haigh is, that at the former place is got, along with the other coal, the six inches of inferior quality just mentioned, which causes the white sediment in burning. At the latter, this is not the case. The soil belongs to Lord Stourton, but the coals to J. and J. Charlesworth, Esqrs., who have another pit at Lofthouse, forty yards deep ; and the coal of which is swift, clear, and ardent.

438 Home Consumptiok.

The coals Beeston Paik are the property of Mr. James Leather, who resides near the pits. Maaj of tbese coals axe consumed the Old Gas Works in Lieeds, and are delivered in the town at abont the same price as those sat from Hie Old Staitfa. The pit opens npon an eleration of considerable heigki, and is situated from two to three miles south-west of lioeds. The bed of coal, which consibts only of one quality, lies from 113 to 144 feet below the sur&ce. The price at the pit is I3d. per pool, weighing about 4i cwt A considerahle quantity of these coals is consumed, but the quality is considered inferior to those supplied fit>m Rothwell Haigh, and oiher places.

At Beeston also there are four pits — two in the occupation of Mr. Hill, and two in the occupaticm of Mr. Carter. The coals, generally, are of inferior quality to those at Beeston Park, being softer ; they are used principally for steam engines. The beck Ke only aJbout 24 to 28 yards below the surfieu. At the pita these coals are sold out in scoops at 3d. eadi; three scoops maikii a pod. Delivered at Leeds> the price is from 4s. 6d. to 5s. per ton. In one of the pits hdonging to Mr. Carter, there is a bed of coal fit for domestic purposes, and sxutable (or making gas ; a good deal of it is now used in dweUing-houses* It is deHvered in Leeds at 7s. 6d. per ton : the pits are about two miles south-west of the town.

The coal at Mansion is the property of & W. Maud, £sq.9 of Sdby. The coUieiy, whsch has been woriced for nearfy ha£f a century, is situated about four miles east of Leeds, and is contiguous to the Leeds and Selby railway, by which conreyance, the coals raised here, and those from Mr. Gasccngnes pit, at Garforth, are conveyed to a depot recently formed

Liverpool And London. 439

at the head of the raOwaj station, at Marsh-lane. Since the forming of this depot, the qnantily brought down to Leeds has been mnch increased ; and large quantities are conveyed from thence to Hamate, Wetherbj, and places adjacent, and even to Selbj< The coals from the two collieries just mentioned, are considered similar in quality, and are sold at the same price. The best deep coal lies about one hundred yards below the surface, and is as durable and equal as most of the coals delivered in Leeds ; these coals are delivered at the depot. Marsh-lane, at Os. 3d. per ton, or 166. 6d. for fifty-three cwt.; at the coUiery the price is Is. per pool, weighing about four cwt.

Colton Colliery is situated about one mile from Manston ; the pots have not been worked more than seven years, and are the property of Mr. £dmufid Dawson, of Rothwell Haigh ; the coals are somewhat inferior to those of Manston and Garforth : the best kind is found about eighty-four yards, and the seeond or little coal about fifty yards below the suz&ce ; the piice at the pits is lOd. per pool, Gt 6s. 8d. for the best, and 68. for the little coal per doaeen, weighiii twenty-eight cwt. There is another jat at Grreen Farm, belonging to the same gentleman.

The town of Liverpool is chiefly suppUed with coat for home consumption from pits at Wigaii, distant twenty-two miles ; firom St. Helen's, distanl twdve miles ; and firom Prescot, at the distance of about eight miles The carrii is by canal and by rtt3-> way — the facilities ei tmnrit by the cdeknrted linef between Manchester and Live9pooI> having led to a considerable reduction in tfie price of the coal tekett from Wigaato Liverpool : at one time, the fticewem Rioted as 10s. lOd. ton, for household whieh

430 Home Consumption.

is a mixture of hard and miall, and usually fluctuates between 1 Is. and 12s. per ton. Hard coal fium ISs. to 16s. It has been contended, bovreTer, that on the whole, the price of coals by the raflroad is little if at all lower than Ike price of the water borne commodity.

little quantities of coal are exported from liver- pool to America : this supply is chiy drawn finom Wigan, near to which a place called Orrell, gives name and character to what is considered the best kind. Hence, Orrell coal/' among the importers in the United States, like '' Wallsend*' in the Lon- don market, is an epithet conferring reputatioa, and which, therefore, the trade imposes by consent on the better kinds of coal.

The consumption of coal in London has been variously estimated : Mr. Buddie, of Newcastle, and Mr. Home, a Westminster coal merchant, both state it to be about a million and a half of chaldrons per year-five or six thousand chaldrons a day. H. Taylor, Esq. Agent to the Duke of Northumberland, gives the following as an analagous estimate of the consumption of coals in Great Britain :— The annual vend of coals carried coastwise from Durham and Northumberland is 3,300,000 tons ; adding one*-fiith more for home consumption, we have 3,060,000 tons. This quantitjr supplies about 5,000,000; and sup posing the whole population of Great Britain to be 15,000,000, this must be trebled ; for though these two-thirds of population are perhaps less able to afford fuel, yet taking into consideration the manu- facturing districts, and the cheapness of coal in the interior, the estimate will not be too high at 1 1,880,000 tons. — This authority assigns, as the produce of our iron works, 600,000 tons to produce which requireQi

Great Britain. 431

at least, four times the quantity of coal in making even pig-metal, and the extraorctinarj consumption in smelting the ores of the Cornish mines — 3,000,000 tons. These items taken collectively give the amount consumed in Great Britain, as 14,880,000 tons ; to which if we add, as exported to Ireland, 700,000 tons, the total consumption of the United Kingdom is 15,680,000 tons.

Mr. Perkins, a colliery owner of Northumberland, during his examination before the Lords* Committee in 1829, presented a table, shewing the real import of coals for each year during the twen1y*eight years, commencing with 1801 ; also the mean annual rate of increase for two periods of fourteen years, and one of twenty-eight years; computed from the actual imports : according to which respective rates of in crease a calculated import is apportioned. From this table it appears, that the real import during the years enumerated was 32,580,515 chaldrons; and the mean annual rate of increase for twenty-eight years, say £rom 1801 to 1828 inclusive, was 22,507 chaldrons, apportioning the entire import. The mean annual rate of increase for fourteen years, viz. from 1801 to 1814 inclusive, was 21,293 chaldrons ; and the mean annual increase for the next fourteen years, viz. from 1815 to 1828 inclusive, was 32,616 chal-r drons.

In 1801, tbe population of London and its

vicini was stated to be 818J29

The import of coals for Uiat year... 869,798

In 1811, the population was 963,276

The average import of ten years,

ending 1811 993,182

The population increased 1.66% per annum for the ten years. The whole average increase of import was ld.52§.

432 Home Consumption.

In 18S1, Uw populadon wts 1,1441031

The average import of coal for 10

years, ending 1831 1,161J84

The population increased 2.33§ per anntim. The whole average increase of import was 19.61

It appears the import of coal did not in these latter ten years retain the same rateable proportion of in crease as the preceding ten years:— i.65;id2: :2.33:2iii

2.30 abated per centageof increased impoit

On the vhole, Mr. Perkins asss aboat nine chaldrons annually for the nse of eight persons in the metropolis before the general extension of gas- irorks, and ten chaildrons since. In 1829,< the fnait- tity of cods bojmtei in the port of London was 1,083,511 chaidrraes 1 vat.

Certain of the northern coal owners, in order to rdieve themselves of the heavy daes which enema- bered sea-borne coal, at one time proposed taxii the commodity generally. Mr. Buddie recommended the altevnative of two plans — taxing all coUierEes, or imposing a tax on every fire-place : the latter mode, fedkoning Ss. per annmn to belaid npon Moh hearth, would, he caicolated, prodace $ixmi million ayeaf . Captain Cochrane, of Hetton Collieiy, reoommended a repeal of the duty, and in lieu thereof the imposi- tion of Is. a ton on all coals consmned over Great Britain, which he believed amounts tx> 15,000,000 of chaldrons, 'Mch woidd inoease Ihe revenue at least j£lOO,000 annually; moreover, it would, he con- tended, give additional employment fo 375 sail of vessels of 180 tons burthmi, 300 sailors, and 6,000 colliers'; besides the increase df men Which the ma-

Waste Of Coal. 4S3

nufactories benefited bj such a measure would natu- rally require."

It may not be improper in closing this Chapter, to advert to what may be regarded as an important item in the home consumption of our coal, — namely, its waste. Those who have not paid some attention to the subject, will probably be but little prepared to learn how large a quantity of this valuable commodity has been constantly destroyed, in one way or other, instead of being sent to market. The value of the article thus profitlessly abstracted from the common stock of our national fuel, depends in part upon its quality in the mine, and in part also upon the price it would fetch either alone, or as mixed with the better sorts of coal.

The Staffordshire collieries produce abundantly a soft sort of coal, considered by Dr. Thompson to be of the same species with the cherry coal, of a velvet- black appearance, which constitutes the greater part of the upper seams of the Glasgow fields, and which is so abundant in Fifeshire. He adds, that in the coal fields on the north, and north-west of Birming- ham, the loss in mining, owing to the tender nature of the substance itself, and the comparatively trifling demand for small coal, amounts to about tnxhthirds of the entire seam ! In allusion to this statement, and the efforts of a celebrated philosopher to economize the application of fuel, Mr. Tredgold exclaims, the waste, which Count Rumford lamented so much, dwindles to nothing, in comparison with the wholesale destruction of a valuable material. Are you a manu- facturer ? Look around, and see what generates the power which enables you to compete with other na- tions. Are you a philanthropist ? Consider that a

2f

434 Home Consumption.

substance is destroyed, which would add comfort to millions of your fellow-creatures : consider the risk at which it is procured, the number of lives that axe lost by explosions, and the misery these catastrophies create — surely, some means of rendering that portion usul, which is now wasted, may be devised ! "

A still more lamentable waste of excellent coal takes place in the South Welsh, and more particularly in the northern collieries, at the pit mouth, in conse- quence of the practice of screening, described in a former Chapter. This is done to meet the taste for round coals so generally prevalent in the metropolis, and also to meet the circumstances of a demand which, before the trade imposts were reduced, and weight substituted for measure, required the coals to be shipped of a large size, however they might be comminuted before reaching the consumer's cellar. In 1829, Mr. Buddie stated before a Committee of the House of Commons, that, taking the small coal which was not worth bringing to bank, and that which was produced in rendering the remainder merchanta- ble together, the waste was from one-fourth to one- third of the whole. Of this amount, a trifling pro- portion is used by the colliers, who have grates adapted for burning it, and a little is sold, at about one-tenth of the price of the screened coal : the remainder is carted away to mend the roads; or, as a more ready method of getting rid of it, is consumed near the witere it has been produced : at one colliery as many as from ninety to one hundred chaldrons a day have been destroyed.

Annals of Philosophy, toI. viSL p. 169.

Chapter Xxiii-

Foreign Coal Trade.

Early Notices of Exportation of Coal — During the Reigns of Henry VIIL and Queen Elizabeth — Charles the First— Act of Trade, 166— Lord North's Reasons for taxing the Coed Trade to Foreign Ports — Produce of our Coal Fields essen tiaUy different from that of our Manufactories — Considerations relative to Free Trade — Politic Objections to an unrestricted Foreign Vend — Cjpf- nions of Mr. Brandling and Mr* Buddie — Profes sor Sedgnnck and Dr. Buckland — Scale of Duties on Coals imported in 1831 — Reduced in 1834 — Duties on Coals sent abroad abolished in 1835 — Impost levied on Coals at Foreign Ports — Remarks on the Policy of the Duties in the Ports of France.

ixS might naturally be expected the earliest notices of the exportation of coal from this country, occur in the records of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and in the Royal Proclamations and other State Papers relative to that town. The first mention of the subject directly is in the rolls of Parliament a.d. 1325, 19 Ed. IL, at which time, as we have already seen, a vessel, the property of one Thomas Rente, of Pontoise, a town

2f2

436 Foreign Coal Trade.

in the ancient dominions of the Kings of England in France, is mentioned as trading to Newcastle-tipon- Tyne with com, and returning with a freight of sea coals. Between that and the next notice which occurs of the exportation of coals, there is an interval of nearly two hundred years, during which period however, there is every reason to suppose coals were exported, though whither or in what quantities we have no information. In 1546, orders were sent from the King (Henry VIII.) to the Mayor of New- castle, to forward, with all possible despatch, three thousand chaldrons of coals to Bullein, in France. This was a hxge shipment; and the trade to France so increased as soon after to be petitioned against, though on what ground does not appear and in the Journals of the House of Commons, Feb. 1, 1563, mention occurs of a bill to restrain the caini of Newcastie coals over sea : in July of the same year, an Act was passed in Scotland to prevent the ex- portation of coal, which had caused a great dearth of fuel in that country. In the year 1600, a patent of Queen Elizabeth, appointing a collector of customs, &c. at Newcastie, recognises the existence of an old imposition of 5s. per chaldron on coals exported beyond sea, which may have been laid on at the time of passing the above-mentioned Act. Toward the end of the reign of this Princess, the home trade had so increased, that the duty of 4d. per chaldron produced £10,000 a year.

A small tract published in 1615, and entitied The Traders Increase,"* informs us that, besides our own ships, hither, even to the luine's mouth, come all our neighbouring nations with their own

Cited ia Andenon'i Diet Comaieice, toL i. p. 494

Early Notices. 437

ahips continually, employing their own shipping and mariners/' The French, who, for ohvious reasons, would be early and considerable customers, are re- presented at this time, as trading to Newcastie for coal in fleets of fifty sail at once, serving the ports of Picardy, Normandy, Bretagne, &c., as &r as Bochd and Bourdeaux ; while the ships of Bremen, Emb* den, Holland, and Zealand, were supplying the in- habitants of Flanders with the same commodity. This foreign vend appears to have raised the price of coals to the home consumer, and thus to haye occasioned some complaints. In 1616, it appears that 13,675 tons of coals were shipped from Newcastle*

It has before been intimated, that the collieries m the north were among the weapons wielded betwei Charles the First and his Parliament: it may be added, that there is still extant a curious letter firom the King to the Marquis of Newcastie, written in fige cyphers from Oxford Nov. 2, 1643, concerning the procuring of arms from Holland in exchange for coals ; and at the beginning of the year following, at a court of the hostmen of Newcastie, it was or- dered that six brethren of that Society should attend the Mayor, to adjust such quantities of coals as should be lent to his Majesty to procure com, powder, and ammunition, for the King's service, pursuant to a commission fit>m the Marquis of Newcastic'f

It was provided by the Act for Trade, 1663, 15 Car. II., that coals transported in English shipping and navigation for his Majesty's plantations, in lieu of all custom, shall pay only for one chaldron of Newcastle measure, one shilling and eightpence;

Rushworth's Collections, part iii vol. iii., p. 368. f Brand's Nowcastle, vol. ii., p. 286.

438 Foreign Coal Trade.

for one chaldron of London measure one shflling, provided good security be given for landing the said coals accordingly/' By an Act passed in 1759, 32 Geo. II., an additional duty was laid on coals exported : five years aflemrards, it appears that 365 vessels— one for every day in the year — laden with coals, cleared out of the Tjnae for foreign ports — a greater number than had previously been known: nearly the same number cleared out in 1772.

From the foregoing statements, it will be seen, that from a very early period in the history of our northern collieries, an over sea trade has been carried on be- tween the port of Newcastle and different foreign countries, and which description of traffic has of hie years extended itself to other British ports particularly London, Swansea, Liverpool, Whitehaven, Sunder- land, Hull, Borrowstoness, Greenock, and upwards of thirty other places. The quantities shipped foreign in 1834, from the eight ports just named, being for the highest, namely, Sunderland, 04,314 tons; and for the lowest, namely, Hull, 12,006 tons ; Newcastle, in the same year, exporting nearly 140,000 tons.

It would have been as tedious to have detailed the numerous fiscal regulations under which each succes- sive Government has allowed this branch of commerce to be carried on, as it would probably be impossible to recognise in every case, the grounds upon which the imposts have been laid or modified. Lord North thought it a good reason for proposing an increase of duty on the foreign trade during his administration, that our enemies ought not to be allowed to bum our coals as cheaply as ourselves ; but that reason ceased to influence the Cabinet, the moment tiiat the Minis-

Molloy de Jure mariUmo.

Considerations Of Policy. 439.

ter was conyinced by the Coal owners, that such a course, instead of increasing, would diminish the revenue.

It will hardly be doubted, by any class of the com- munity, except, perhaps, some of the exporters them- selves, that coal shipped for foreign consumption, admitting that it ought to be exported at all, is a most legitimate commodity for taxation ; nor will it probably be denied, even by the stoutest advocates for free trade, that coal, as a species of merchandise, differs essentially from agricultural produce, or nuu nufactured goods. In reference to the latter point in particular, it may be affirmed that, so long as we can command

But mtm and ooa], die craftsmao vid Us fires,'*

the manu&cturing skill and industry of Great Britain may sustain her claim to precedence in the market of the world, — even while she draws many of the mateiials of this pre-eminence from other countries. And with respect to those productions of the earth which are requisite for the sustenance of man, these it is well known may be raised, almost ad libitum, so long as fertilily can be maintained. Coal, oh the other hand, being incapable of reproduction or in- crease, it foUowB that whatever force several argu ments for or against a free trade in grain or manu- fiactured articles may have, they do not legitimately apply to the commodity in question. It might be urged that the exhaustion of our lead and tin mines by foreign traffic in their produce, should be repro- bated on the same grounds — and with propriety, could it at the same time be shewn, that these metsds are as essential as coal to our domestic comfort and manufacturing prosperity.

443 Foreign Coal Trade.

scription of coal we can get no market for* I should saj tbat the object would be to mannfactore a coal fit for the home market, and then see what is the residue fix)m such manufacture, and to consider what is die best market and the best way of disposing of it, so as to produce the greatest revenue to Govern- ment, and to pay the mine owner." So far as foreign sale could be made of small coal, which is at present wasted, the alteration would, of course, be one of advantage to all parties ; but the relief sought bj the coal owners at larg was of a more extended natnre. What the coal owners ask in the first instance, and to which," says Mr. Brandling, an affluent individual of their body, I conceive they are fairly entitled, is a gradual reduction and abolition of duties both ex- port and home, that the coals may be put upon die same footing with all other articles of produce of English industry from English property. If that cannot be accomplished, an equalization of the export duties with the home duties, an equalization of the duties upon the inland and seaborne coals, so that they may be in the same market with the same du- ties, and a removal of all the impediments to a firee exercise of our trader" Now, it is precisely because coals, as to the nature of their production, and not- withstanding tiie application of the term riiannfac- ture," do appear to differ so essentially from other articles produced by English industry fix)m English property, that sound policy seems to require that some impediment should be placed in the way of a firee exercise of the over-sea trade in coals.

It will be remembered that the answer of Mr. Buddie, before cited, has no reference to the question by which it was elicited, namely, the possible ex-

Anticipations Of Mr. Williams. 443

haostion of our mines ; nor does the yolmninous evi- dence taken before the Committee of the House of Lords contain hardly a single allusion to the subject though, as we shall presently see, it was otherwise in the examinations in the Commons. I have not the smallest doubt that the generality of the inhabi- tants of Great Britain believe that our coal mines are inexhaustible, and the general conduct of the nation, so far as relates to this subject, seems to imply that the inexhaustibility of our coals is universally held as an established fact. The conduct of the public says so in plain enough language. If it was not a generally received opinion, would the rage for trans- porting coals be allowed to go on without limitation or remorse ? But it is full time that the public were undeceived in a matter which so nearly concerns the welfare of this flourishing island." Thus wrote the author of the Natural History of the Mineral King- dom" nearly fifty years ago : this, indeed, is but a specimen of the staple of his complaint, which is drawn out to a considerable length, and frequently in terms calculated to force a smile, notwithstanding the grave corroborative testimony of the learned Professor Buckland, recently delivered before a Committee of the House of Commons. It is consolatory, however, that even the last-named authority has placed in a remote era the consummation anticipated by Mr. Williams in the following paragraph :— " The pre- sent rage for exporting coals to other nations may aptly be compared to a careless spendthrift, who wastes all his youth, and then heavily drags on a wretched life to miserable old age, and leaves nothing for his heirs. When our coal mines are exhausted, the prosperity and glory of this flourishing and for-

444 Foreign Coal Trade.

tunate island is at on end. Our cities aad great towns must then become ruinous heaps for ivant of fiiel and our mines and manufiekctories must fail from the same cause, and consequently our commerce must likewise fail* In short, the commerce, wealth, importance, glory, and happiness of Great Britain will decay and gradually dwindle away to notlung, in proportion as our coal and other mines fail : and the future inhabitants of this island must live, like its I first inhabitants, by fishing and hunting/'

Our author, indeed, somewhat mitigates the seve- rity of his sentence upon those inhabitants of London and the south-east coast, who may be unkappy enough to witness the exhaustion of the coal about Newcastle, by the consideration, that there is a pretty good fund of coal in Fife, and other places upon both sides of the Frith of Forth, which may be sent to the metropolis and to other places/' Ireland, too, is consoled, by reference to another Scotch tarea- suiy, though the allusion is couched in terms evi- dently untempered by any recollection of the ex- haustiiess peat mosses of the Emerald Isle. The city of Dublin," says Mr. Williams, 'and many other parts of Ireland, depend upon Great Britain for a necessary supply of coals, even for cnlinaiy uses; and, I hinted before, thai the collieries of Whitehaven, from whence Dublin is chiefly siq>plied, are already very deep. However, there is a valuable and extensive magazine of coal for Irish consumption treasured up in the county of Ayr ; and it is well for Dublin, and other parts of Ireland, that there are such magazines in Ayrshire and the north-west of England ; and what would become of Dublin, &c. were these coals to fail ? In that event, it might be

Considerations Of Policy. 446

said with propriety, that the Irish voltmteers would blow a cold coal. Thej little think of this when they begin to swagger, disturb the peace, and neglect their proper occupations. They little think that Bri- tain can starve them, knock np many of their manu- hcUme8y and ruin their cities for want for fuel/'

Such were the apprehensions, and such the style, of an ingrtiious but verbose writer on the coal trade half a century ago. While, however, we may be allowed to smile at the manifestation of such quaint patriotism, it must at the same time be confessed that the subject is really one of great importance in a national point of view.

In the examination before the Committee of the House of Commons above referred to. Professor Sedgwick expressed himself as not being prepared to answer the question as to the expediency of ex porting coals : he conceives, however, that the best beds in the Newcastle field are not likely, at the present rate of consumption, to last above 350 or 400 years. Dr. Buckland, of Oxford, makes an estimate nearly similar. The latter eminent geologist seems to recognise the distinction above contended for as existing between coal and other descriptions of pro- duce, whether agricultural or manufacturing: few countries are so sterile but they may be made to yield, according to their cultivation, some of the fruits of the earth ; and still fewer are they where, under determined or compulsory circumstances, the more artificial wants of life may not be to some extent pro* duced ; but an absolute prohibition of the export of coal fi:om this country, could not have the slightest tendency to encourage the woridng of mines abroad where the fossil does not already exist. In the Ne-

446 Foreign Coal Trade.

therlands, there is a very extensive field of coal, which is largely worked ; and as that b one of our most convenient export countries, the question arises, whether any vacuum created in the current vend by a prohibitory enactment, would not natorally be filled up by additional working in their own mine ? Un- doubtedly it would ; and thus, says Dr. Buckland, '' lead to the more rapid exhaustion of that mine," and consequently, it is rejoined, to the encourage- ment of coal mines abroad. The learned Doctor rebuts the force of this inference. If,'* says he, '' encouragement could cause the production of beds of coal as of annual crops of com, it would be so ; but as nature has limited the quantity of coal, and any reproduction of it is impossible, if you increase the consumption, the total exhaustion will of course be accelerated." As to the inquiry, whether it be probable that there may be a sufficient quantity of coal in the districts abroad to meet the demand for the foreign manufacturer in the foreign market, the examinant appeals to the case of France, and. attri- butes the comparative absence of manufactores in that countiy to the deficiency of coal. It is remark- able, that the Netherlander exports coals to America, while France, which is close at hand, and wants them for her manufacturers, does not take them : the rea son assigned for this apparent anomaly is, that the carriage to America is water carriage, and often back carriage, while the carrying over France is chiefly land carriage. The policy of permitting the expor- tation of coals to foreign parts firom Newcastle, is, in the opinion of the competent authority above quoted, '' permitting foreigners to consume the vitals of our own posterity. I consider," says he, coals the sta-

Former Export Duties. 447

mina upon which the manufacturing prosperitj of the country primarily depends ; and I think it our duty not to spare one ounce of coals to any person but ourselves."

. By the Act of 1831> the following duties were im- posed upon the exportation of coals, culm, and cin- ders, in Ueu of those theretofore payable : — Coals, not being small coals, exported to any place, not being a British possession ; videlicet, —

In a Britisli ship, the ton 0 3 4

In a ship not British, the ton 0 6 8

Small coals, culm, and cinders exported to any place not being a British possession ; videlicet, —

£. 8. d.

In a Britisb ship, the ton 0 2 0

In a ship not British, the ton 0 4 0

No coals to be deemed ''small coals'' for the pur- poses of this Act, except such as shall haye been screened in the manner directed by the Act 56 Geo. III. cap. 127, that such as will pass through a f-of- an-inch screen.

By a return to Parliament, it appears that during the year ending 5th January 1833, the following amount of coals had been exported from the United Kingdom to dijflferent ports of the Mediterranean, namely — to Gibraltar, 10,161 tons ; to Spain and the Ballearic Islands, 605 tons; to Malta, 3,422 tons; to Italy and the Italian Islands, 4,030 tons; to the Ionian Islands, 1,180 tons ; to the Russian ports in the Black Sea, 2,435 tons ; to Turkey and Conti- nental Greece, 323 tons ; to the Morea and the Greek Islands, 647 tons ; to Egypt, 7,260 tons* ;— total,

It waa remailced during the diflcussions on the Coal Trade in 1831, that owing to the enormous amount of duties which accumulated upon the com-

Foreign Coal Trade.

S0,072 tons. In 1834, the rates of duty were still further reduced : from the 6th of August, instead of the above-noted imposts of 3s. 4d. and 28. per ton, an ad valorem charge of 10 per cent was levied : and in lieu of the other two items of 66. 8d. and 4s. per ton, an uniform rate of 4s. per ton was imposed. The total quantity of coals, cinders, and culm ex- ported from the United Kingdom to foreign countries in 1834, was 615,255 tons : it was distributed to the following places, in the proportions indicated by the figures: —

Tons.

Rawia S6filA

Sweden 11,658

Norway..! 373

Denmark 72,186

Ftassia 23,787

Germany 60168

Holland 94,447

Belgium 270

France 59,690

Portugal, Azores, and

Madeira 13,714

Spain and the Canaries 1,583

Gibraltar 5,856

Italy 12,587

MalU 7,715

Ionian Islands 1,250

Turkey and Continental

Greece 1,329

Morea and Greek Islands 1,471 Cape of Good Hope... 879

Tons.

6,738 5,379

Other parts of Africa...

East Indies and China

New South Wales, Van

Dieman's Land, and

Swan Kirer, 21

British and North Ame- rican Colonies 55,201

British West Indies 43,617

Foreign West Indies .. 845 Unit. States of Ainerica 39,855

Mexico 9. 5

Columbia 54

Brazil 1,637

States of the Rio de la

Plata 966

ChiH 170

Peru , 118

Isles of Guernsey, Jer- sey, Aldemey, and Man 63,182

Of the total amount above stated, 3,654 tons were cinders, of which neaxlj one-third went to Denmark :

laodity between its deliyerj at the northern mines and its consamption in Oa metropolis, Newcastle ooals wer aotaally sold cheaper in Onmd Caiio than in London* As an instance of the distance to which this Talnable foal is carried, Captain Head mentions that the coals used at Buenos Ayies eome ftom Newcastle !

Repeal Of Export Duty. 449

there was also 1,845 tons of culm, the whole of which, with the exception of a trifling fraction, was for the use of the Norman bles last named on the foregoing list. The amoont of duties receiyed on the whole 615,265 tons, was £34,2 10s. 2d.

The northern coal owners continuing to complain, and Grovemment heing anxious to afford them relief, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, on announcing the contents of his Budget in the spring of 1835, pro- posed to remit ahcether the duties on coals, cinders, and culm exported. This was accordingly done; and at present there is no impost on coals exported to foreign coimtries from Great Britain in our own ships. Vessels fix>m Russia and Holland, as States not recognising the reciprocity treaties, pay 4s. per ton on all kinds. The policy of thus facilitating the conveyance, to any extent, of so essential an article as cosd, and with no object but that of relieving the mine owners, must be very doubtful.

While, however, we send our coals to other conn* tries thus freely, our customers in many instances tax the admission of the commodity into their ports. The imposts levied by the Swedish Government on coals imported from Great Britain, comprise duty of customs, convoy duty, and town dues, amounting together to 12s. 2d. sterling on the Newcastle chal- dron, or about 50 per cent, on the prime cost. These charges are ostensibly imposed to favour a certain coal mine at Hoganas, in Scania.

The duties paid on the importation of coals ftcm this country into the kingdom of Denmark, axe £2 18s. lOd. upon one keel of 8 Newcastle chaldrons, or 20 tons of Scotch coals.

The largest amount of coals exported from the

2g

450 Foreign Coal Trade.

United Kingdom to any one place is to H<dland : the terms upon whicli they were admitted in 1834, are stated below, in the official note of the British Minister, transmitted in reply to a Parliamentaij inquiry ordered by the House of Commons in that year, and pending the reduction of the foreign duties. In reply to an order made by the House of Com- mons, in May 1834, for returns from Copenhagen, Hamburgh, and Rotterdam, of the number and names of British vessels entering those ports laden with eoals Consul Macgregor prefaced his despatch to Sir George Shee, with the following statement relative to 1833 : — '' It would appear from these returns that fifty British ships, of the burthen of 9,740 tons with 431 men, were employed in the coal trade to Copen- hagen last year [1833], and that the quantities im- ported there have amounted to 2,381 tons and 4,261 chaldrons, forming an aggregate of 13,0981- tons weight of coals." Mr. Macgregor adds, that on an average, during the years 1831, 1832, and 1833, not fewer than 308 British, and 189 foreign vessels were employed to the Baltic during each of those years : and, moreover, that the importation at Copenhagen

Holland. La Haje, le 19 May, 1834.

Monsieur, — En rtponae k yotre office da 5 dn courant, j'ai rhonnear de porter & votre comudssanoe qne la roi da 8 Join 1831 (Journal Offieiel, No. 15) a fiz loB drolls d'entre sur le charbon de terre k deoz florins per mil- lier deliyres des Pays Bas, sans dtotinclaion d'origin, et poor toas Ivillons £traiigeire.

£n consnence, le charbon de teire de la Roer, imports per ean, est aasigett k ce droit, ansa Men que celni anirant par mer d'Angletenra, d'Ecosae oa dlrlaade : I'importadon snr navires des Flays Bas estfiranche des droitss ceaz de oortie se montent k diz cents, et 1m droits de transit k on florin, galement par millier de liYres des Pays Bas.

Je saisis, &c. (Sigak) H. DE ZcnsM de Ntsvklt.

A M. Jemlngham, Charg d' Affaires de sa Mjest Britanniqae.

Imposts In Foreign Ports. 451

averaged 134 tons weight of coals to every 100 tons of shipping: total amount of coals annually imported into the Baltic may be estimated, according to that computation, at about 110,000 tons, being nearly one-half of the quantity exported by Great Britain to foreign countries/* No duties whatever are levied in the ports of Russia upon coals imported from the United Kingdom ; indeed, so necessary is it considered to give every facility to the importation of that article, that it is allowed to be landed any where without a previous inspection at the Custom house, a form to which all other articles exempted from duty are subjected. From the year 1825 to the end of 1831, the duties with which coals were taxed on entering the Prussian States, amounted, in the eastern provinces, to dollars per zentner, or cwt. ; and in the western, to li dollars. Since 1832, and at present, li dollars per cwt. is levied throughout. In the last-mentioned year, the importation to the Baltic was 603,465 cwts.; to other places, 454,115, maMng a total of 1,057,580 cwts.

In Portugal, the duties of 15 per cent, paid upon coals imported from Great Britain into the port of Lisbon, are levied upon valuations put upon them by the Custom-house authorities, which vary according to the market price. These duties are charged on a measure termed a pipa, which is equal to dk tons of 20 cwts. each. There are no coals imported but from Great Britain. Coals axe admitted duty free into all the ports of the kingdom of the two Sicilies. There is a duty levied in the ports of France upon coals imported from the United Kingdom, of 1 franc, 10 centimes per 100 kilogrammes, which amounts to 11 francs, or about 10 shillings per ton.

2o 2

45d FOREIGN COAL TRADE.

A great deal has been said about the impolicy, on the part of the French, in taxing the importation of foreign coals : it is not intended in this place to give anj opinion, but merely to state that the reasons offered by the late Minister of Commerce in France, as a justification of the duty, are the following :— " Coal," says he, " is very abundant in our country ; and at the place of its production is sold as cheap as in any other country in the world. At St. Etienne, the cost of extracting coal is quite as low as in Wales. The cause of the high price to consumers is not, therefore, the greater expense incurred in working our mines, but in the cost of carriage. That which may be purchased for forty centimes at St. Etienne, costs three to four irancs at Rouen, and four to five francs at Bordeaux. Since, then, the cause of the deamess does not proceed from the poverty of the mines, nor the inability of the workmen, but is owing to the insufficiency of works on the surface of our sdl for making easy the communications between one part of the country and another, it would be the height of injustice to sacrifice the class of producers by a reduction of the duty, which, if removed to the extent of one third only, would occasion such an im- portation from England as would ruin our finest establishments."

Is it not," says a recent authority, a sufficient answer to this argument, if we enquire what it is which principally causes the means of transport in France to be so imperfect and expensive ? Whether it be not principally, if not entirely, the high prices of coal and iron which deter from the formation of canals and railroads ? The very example cited by

Companion to the Almanack, 1835.

Duties In France. 453

the Minister as a justification of his system suf- ficiently proves of how much greater benefit it must be to admit foreign raw materials, which would have 80 important an effect upon the entire industry of the country, than it is to extend at the general expense, just that amount of protection to a few capitalists which enables them to draw a scanty and precarious return for their unnatural investments/' Coal/' says the Minister of Commerce, was worth five or seven tmacs at Mulhausen ; since the opening of the canal from the Rhone to the Rhme, the article is worth only three francs, fifty centimes, and will be further reduced to two francs, fifty centimes, when die proposed communications with Epinac shall be completed."

In this point of view, the duties imposed on the importation of foreign coals and iron assume," says the advocate for free trade quoted above, the form of a tax levied upon the commercial and manufac* turing interests of France, for the veiy purpose of retarding the march of internal improvement These duties are, besides, partial and unjust, inasmuch as they operate peculiarly in the parts of France where the coal and iron of native producticm are the dearest. Except at those parts, the excessive cost of transport which the Minister brings forward to excuse the existing system, would operate as an extensive pro- tection to the coal mines and iron masters of the in- terior, where English coal and iron could no more compete with them, than they could now compete in the parts with the freely admitted products of Eng- land."

Chapter Xxiv.

Probable Duration Op Our Coal.

lyifficuU to a$sign the consumption of Coal for future penods— Estimate of the quantity remaining un- wrought in Durham and Northumberland — State- ments of Mr. Tayht and Professor Sedgwick— Decay of the Northern Mines wili probably transfer the London Coal trade to Scotland and South Wales — Quantity of nsyrkable Coal probably over-rated — Opinions of Dr. Thomson and Mr. BaJceweU, rela- tive to the duration of the Northern Collieries.

L HE prospective exhaustioii, at some remote period, of the valuable contents of the various coal fields of Great Britain, and the probable consequences of such an event, have given rise to a variety of calculations and predictions; some of the latter, as we have already seen, sufficiently amusing. While, however, it is manifestly inconclusive, to estimate accord- ing to present demand the consumption of coals for centuries to come ; and still more so to assign any specific condition of society to such a remote period ; we are warranted, in the first place, in assuming, that the demand for Uus species of fuel will not diminish but increase, with every imaginable condition of the

Durham And Northumberland. 455

progress of society ; and secondly, we have before us the undoubted fact, that our mines are not inexhaust-. ible. In addition to this, there is the most direct evidence to show how far some of the most valuable beds in the northern coal fields have been worked out already; at the same time, that tolerably satisfactory calculations have been made as to the quantity re-, maining unwrought

The following is an estimate of the extent and produce of the Durham and Northumberland coal fields, compiled by H. Taylor, Esq., colliery agent to the Duke of Northumberland, and himself a coal owner in the latter county : —

Sq. MUes.

Durham. From South Shields southward to Castle Edeii twenty-one miles, thence westward to West Auckland,

thirtj-two miles, north-east from West Aackland to £1- tringham, thirty-three miles, and thence to Shields,

twenty-two miles, heing an extent of area of 594

Northumberland. From Shields northwards, by an aver-

Portion excavated. In Durham — On the Tyne, say, 39

On the Wear, 40

In Northumberland, say thirteen

miles by two, 26

— 106

Estimating the workable coal strata at an average Tons,

thickness of twelve feet, the contents of one square mile will be 1290,000 tons, and of 732 square miles, 9,069,480,000

Deduct one-third part for loss by small coal, in- terceptions by dykes, and other interruptions, 3,023,160,000

Remaiuder, 6,046,320,000

466 Probable Duration Of Our Coal*

This remainder is, according to Mr. Taylor ade quateto supply the present Tend from Newcasfle, Sunderhmd, Hardey, Blydi, and Stockton of 8,500,000 tons, for a period of 1,727 yean. In the opinion of Professor Sedgwick, however, this amount must be exaggerated about one-half in con sequence of the existence of certain sterQe trai which the calculation assumes to contain the average deposit of coal. ''The best information I bave" says the learned Professor, '' gives a rich portion of the coal field, extending from the neighbourhood of Chester-le-Street, down the country near West Auck'* land ; and the richest portion of that field, as ftr as it is at present known by actual workings, is between the Wear and the escarpment of the magnesian lime- stone ; and I have reason to believe, partly upon a few observations of my own, but mainly upon inform- ation obtained from others, that none of the best beds of the Wear district, excepting the lowest, the Hutton seam, are found much to the west of the Wear ; on the west side of that river the Hutton seam is covered by only a small number of coal measures ; the coal is britde, and lies at a comparatively small depth, but is said to be of good quality ; it therefore appears that the rich part of this division of the coal field is confined in that narrow zone extending between the Wear, to the escarpment of the magnesian limestone.

'' On this question I have recently obtained more full information from a gentleman, with whom I for* merly examined a portion of the district : he states that ' there are five good workable seams of coal in the Wear district, between the outcrop of the mag- nesian lime and the east side of the Wear, extending from the neighbourhood of Cfaester4e-Street to Bishop

PROFESSOR Sedgwick's opinion. 457

Aucklaiid ; in this district, the five good seams that majr be expected are the following : — Five Quarter, average thiclmess four feet ; the High Main, sis: feet ; the Maudlin, five and a half; the Low Main, four ; the Hutton, six feet ; — that of those five, the High Main, Low Main, and Hutton are those on the exists ence of which jou might perhaps speculate with the greatest confidence; that the High Main and the Hutton are the most certain to prove true ; that in making the calculation of the quantity of coal still to be worked in the above district, it might be reason ably supposed, that three out of the five seams (ble- ther averaging in thickness of good fire coal about thirteen feet) might be worth working at the present time ; and that a fourth may be worked hereaAer, Yihea the best seams are exhausted.' The writer states, that he is not acquainted with any colliery where all the five seams are worth working at present, or likely to become so : one or two of them are always found defective in thickness or quality."

Such are the considerations affecting the east side of the Wear ; on the west aide," the Professor pro- ceeds, '' the Five Quarter coal has generally cropped out ; and the High Main, Maudlin and Low Main, if not out, are often so near the surface as to be good for nothing. The Five Quarter breaks out in a ravine below Auckland Castle, and the Main is probably too near the surface to the west of that spot to be good for any thing. The writer of the letter adds:— ' I have understood that the working seams in most of the small collieries on the west of the Wear, are supposed to be the Hutton seam ; the coal those col- lieries produce is of an excellent quality, but tender, and looks as if it came from the Hutton.' Taking

458 Probable Duration Of Our Coal.

those circumstaiices into consideratLon he does not think we can fairly calculate upon more than one seam on the west side of the Wear within the above northern and southern limits; and he states the probable thickness to be four feet nine inches of good coal. He adds, ' there is good coal to the south and south-west of Auckland ; but I am not aware of above one or two seams at most in that district.' Con- sidering, then, the uncertainty of supplies of coal finom under the magnesian limestone, — that a large portion of the best Tyne coal district is exhausted ; that the excavations in the best seams of the Wear are now very extensive, — that, in fact, the best part of the coal in the neighbourhood of the navigable parts of both rivers is gone, and that so many of the best seams crop out within a short distance of the west bank of the Wear, he is inclined to think that Mr. Taylor was far beyond the mark when he spoke of the probability of the coal of Northumberland aud Durham lasting 1,700 years. He then adds these words : ' I am myself convinced, that with the present increased and increasing demand for coal, four hun- hundred years will leave little more than the name of our best seams ; and when they are gone, those who are living will find London supplied from the great Welsh and Scotoh coal fields at a cheaper rate.' He then goes on to state, that our northern coal field will probably be on the wane before three hundred years have elapsed ; that is, in reference to the other

An intermediate period has been assigned by Messn. Bailey and CvUey' who, in their general view of the district, estimate the duration of the ooal at eight hundred and twenty-five years. The minimum amount is probably that given by Dr. Mac Nab, who estimates the extent of the coal fields in Northumberland and Durham at 20 miles by 15=300 square miles, com- puting, at the same time, that one square mile is equal to the consumption of a year.

Unwrought Portion May Be Measured. 450

coal jGields, by which the London market will by that time, begin to be partially supplied. There is one circumstance stated in this letter/' adds Mr. Sedg- wick, " which I may just allude to : A great deal of coal appears formerly to have been left under- ground in consequence of a want of general plans or maps of the workings ; a number of excavations have taken place independently of each other; and the consequence is, there is a great number of piers or large barriers between the old coal works, some of which it may be almost impossible to remove."*

The learned Professor, in reducing the estimated supply of coal from 1 700 to 400 years, must be un- derstood as speaking of those good beds mostly worked for the metropolis and for exportation, and the exhaustion of which, he assumes, will transfer the London trade to South Wales, where the coal is not of so good a quality as that of Newcastle, neither can it be at present so cheaply conveyed to the metro- polis. The coals in the northern districts may last as long, or even longer than Mr. Taylor supposes, if we take in all those impure beds that may hereafter be excavated by persons resident on the spot for the use of their own households : and of course, the thin coal — all the little beds of six or seven inches would be got out, before the workings were finally given up. Professor Buckland agrees in the main with Mr. Sedgwick, and thinks the result of Mr. Taylor's cal- culation "egregiously exaggerated.'* Mr. Buddie, an individual probably better acquainted with the coal district on the Tyne, than any other person, — but a decided advocate for an unlimited foreign vend, — declined, when examined before the Committee of the

Evidence before House of Commons, 1829, foL 232.

460 Probable Duration Of Oub Coal.

House of Commons, to commit himself by any loose answer to the question as to how lon, according to the present rate of consumption, the coal fields in Durham and Northumberland would last? ''be- cause/' says he, '' it may be ascertained/' Indeed, this intelligent viewer expressed himself as confident of being able to reduce the whole to actual measnie- ment and calculation in a month : and this, he ob- served, might be done with reference to certain dis- tricts, so as to avoid Ibe obvious objectLona which the coal owners would have to the publication o£ details relative to their particular sections.

Dr. Thomson, of Edinburgh, published some years ago, a series of calculations on this subject ; and stzD later, Mr. Bakewell in his popular work on Geology, discusses the question of coal, and the period when the coal mines of England will probably be exhausted. This competent and ingenious observer says, — We cannot but regard the exhaustion of our coal beds as involving the destruction of a great portion of our private comfort and national prosperity. Nor is the period very remote when the coal districts, which at present supply the metropolis with fuel, will cease to yield any more. The number and extent of the prin- cipal coal beds in Northumberland and Durham is known ; and from these data it has been calculated that the coal in these counties will last 360 years*" Mr. Bailey, in his survey of Durham, states, that one-

It has been laid down as a role, ihat '' a cubic yard of coal will prodnce eight boQa of cools, each boQ containing eight pecks of four and a hslf g*l- loasy and each gallon containing 3688 cubic inches. Thexefore, fioai thst role, an acre of coal stratum, one foot Uiick, will produce (if all got) thif- one tens, each ten containing 4S0 coal bolls ; or that acre will produce 1510 tons : eonaeqaentlf, an equsl ana of stratunii 2, 8, 4, &c. feet thick, wiU produce 2, 3, 4, &c. times the quantity of tens or tons of coal that a sesm of one foot thick will produce."—- Fmtricil's Stierrmieou* Swrveywg p. 203.

Opinions Of Mr. Bakewell. 461

third of the coal being already got, the coal districts will be exhausted in 200 years. It is probable, that many beds of inferior coal which are now neglected, may, in future, be worked, but the consumption of coal being greatly increased since Mr. Bailey publish- ed his survey, we may admit his calculation to be an approximation to the truth, and that the coal of North- umberland and Durham will be exhausted in a period not greatly exceeding 200 years. Dr. Thomson, in the Annals of Philosophy, has calculated, that the coal of these districts, at the present rate of consump- tion, will last 1000 years: but his calculations are with his own statements. Dr. Thomson has also greatly orer-rated the quantity of coal in these dis- tricts, as he has calculated the extent of the principal beds from that of the lowest, which is erroneous ; for many of the principal beds crop out before they reach the western termination of the coal fields* With due allowance for these errors, and for the quantity of coal already worked out, (say one-third) tlie 1000 years of Dr. Thomson will not greatly exceed the period assigned by Mr. Bailey for the complete exhaustion of coal in these counties, and may be stated at 300 years.

''It cannot be deemed uninteresting," proceeds Mr. Bakewell, '' to enquire what are the repositories of coal that can supply the metropolis and the south- em counties, when no more can be obtained from the Tyne and the Wear. Tlie only coal fields of any extent on the eastern side of England, between Lon- don and Durham, are those of Derbyshire, and those in the West Riding of Yorkshire. The Derbyshire coal field is not of sufficient magnitude to supply, for

462 Probable Duration Of Our Coal.

any long period, more than is required for home con- sumption, and that of the adjacent counties* There are many valuahle beds of coals in the western parts of the West Riding of Yorkshire, which are jet on- wrought ; but the time is not very far distant, when they must be put in requisition to supply the Tast demand of that populous manufacturing county, wliich at present consumes nearly all the produce of its own coal mines. In the midland counties, Staffordshire possesses the nearest coal district to the metropolis of any great extent ; but such is the immense daily con- sumption of coal in die iron furnaces and foundries, that it is generally believed this will be the first of our own coal fields that will be exhausted. The thirty feet bed of coal in the Dudley coal field is of limited extent, and in the present mode of working it, more than two-thirds of the coal is wasted and left in the mine. If we look to Whitehaven, or Lan- cashire, or to any of the minor coal fields in the west of England, we can derive little hope of their being able to supply London and the southern counties with coal, after the import fails firom Northumberland and Durham. We may thus anticipate a period not very remote, when all the English mines of coal and iron. J stone will be exhausted.

" Fortunately, however," Mr. Bakewell adds, " we have in South Wales, adjoining the British Channel, an almost exhaustless supply of coal and ironstone, which are yet nearly unwrought It has been stated that this coal-field extends over about 1200 square miles, and that there are twenty-three beds of worka- ble coal, the total average thickness of which is ninety- five feet, and the quantity contained in each acre is 100,000 tons, or 65,000,000 tons per square mile.

]

South Welsh Deposit. 463

If from this we deduct one half for waste, and for the minor extent of the upper beds, we shall have a clear supply of coal equal to 32,000,000 tons per square mile. Now if we admit that 5,000,000 tons of coal, from the Northumberland and Durham mines, is equal to nearly one third of the total consumption of coal in England, each square mile of the Welsh coal-field would yield coal for two years' consump- tion; and as there are from 1,000 to 1,200 square miles in this coal field, it would supply England with fuel for 2,000 years after all our English coal mines are worked out. It is true, that a considerable part of the coal in South Wales is of an inferior quality, and is not at present burned for domestic use ; but in proportion as coals become scarce, improved methods of burning it will assuredly be discovered, to prevent any sulphureous fames from entering apartments, and also to economise the consimiption of fuel in all our manufactoring processes."*

BakeweU's InUoduction to Geologji 1828, p. 178, et seq.

Chapter Xxv.

Foreign Coal Deposits.

Importance of Foreign Coal Deposits to GhreatBritam — General Phenomena of the Carboniferous Strata similar in different Countries — Organic Ilemaisu and accompanying Rocks — Independent Coal For- motion of Werner — Occurrence of Coal tn Spam — Near Dresden — In Silesia — Vast Deposits m France-In Belgium — Fire DampCoal Fields of Germany — Fossil Fishes — Coal in Sweden, Nor- nniy, and Poland — Immense Depositories of An thracite and Bituminous Coal in North America — Scarcity of Fuel in some parts of South America — Rhode Island, Canada, and Australia contain Coal — Strata on Fire at Cape Breton — European ho* calities of Lignite and Fossil Wood.

Although the design of the present work, as to its more immediate bearings might be considered as completed by the foregoing Chapters, a few brief notices of one branch of the subject in reference to oilier countries may be appropriately introduced m conclusion. The subject of foreign coal deposits is by no means one exclusiyely interesting to the geologist ; it involves important considerations of a

IMPORTANCE OF THESE TO BJtITAIN. . 465

commercial nature in relation to Great Britain. For, not only must the coal trade of this country be in some degree influenced by competition with the supply of so important an article from other and remote sources; but the districts containing coal mines, may be expected, hereafter, to become, in certain cases, the seats of manufactures, perhaps rivalling in importance, or it may be, surpassing those which, owing to the abundance and acissibleness of our fossil fuel, this country has long carried on so advantageously.

It has been remarked, that the great coal forma- tion appears to abound most under the polar circle, and in the two temperate zones, but it is rarer to- wards the equator : a geographical distribution sup- posed to be connected with its formation. Although, as might be expected, the carboniferous strata, when viewed on the large scale, occasionally present some anomalies, as compared with the corresponding series in our own country,— yet stiU, the similarity in cer-

remarkable. Tins is more particularly manifest in the occurrence of sandstone and bituminous shales, or beds of compressed and indurated mud ; together with those vegetable impressions which, although exhibit- ing specific difierences from those met with in Britain, belong, for the most part, to analagous types.

We have already adverted to the opinion of M. Brongniart, that at the epoch of the coal formation, there existed eqiseta, or horse-tail plants, upwards of ten feet high, and six inches in diameter ; tree-ferns, of from forty to fifty feet in height ; and arborescent lycopodiacea, of from sixty to seventy feet high. Of the above classes of vegetables, as Mr. Lyell observes,

2h

466 Foreign Coal Deposits.

the species are all small at present, in cold cliniates ; while, in tropical regions, there occur, together with small species, many of a much greater size ; but their development at present, even in the hottest parts o( the globe, is inferior to that indicated by the petrified stems of the coal fonnation. If the gigantic size and form of these fossil plants are remarkable, still more so is the extent of their geographical distribation : for impressions of arborescent ferns, such as charac- terize our English carboniferous strata, hare been brought from Melville Island, in lat. 75"*.

The geological equivalent of our great carboniferous group of rocks, as met with on the continent of Europe is what is called by the disciples of Werner, the In- dependent Coal Fonnation. It does not occur in the Alps, or in the basin of the Po ; indeed, it is asserted, that the true coal measures do not exist in Italy; and this remark has, by some persons, been hastily ex- tended to Spain and Sicily. Opinions, on this point, exhibit, as might be expected, various discrepancies, as geological enquiries have hitherto been limited, if not in their range, certainly in the number of scientific stations, and accredited observers at remote places; while travellers and geographers have commonly used the term coal,*' in the most loose and popular sense.

As already intimated, the coal strata in Europe do not always conform to British analogies ; and in some localities there seems so little agreement, that indivi- duals pretending to geological acuteness have been misled thereby. In Spain, coal deposits are known in Andalusia, Estremadura, Catalonia, Arragon, and Castile, and the Asturias : but the beds are commonly thin, and the workings, for the most part, of little im-

Frinciplea of Geology, toI. i. p. 101.

I

Spain, France, &C. 467

portance : it seems, however Ihat one exception must be made with reference to the last-named locality, where the beds which are described as " vast," and supposed by Professor Hausman to be subordinate to the immense iron-stone hills near Bilboa. In Por- tugal, there are some trifling coal works. True coal measures exist at Postchapel, near Dresden, at Fried- land, and near to Temovitz, in Silesia ; in the latter place, there are vast deposits of valuable fuel ; as also at Namur Saare Brooke, and St. Etienne in France.

One of the richest deposits of coal that is known, forms the nearly continuous series of coal basins placed in a belt about one himdred and fifty miles long, and six miles broad, which crosses the north of France, containing the coal mines of Valenciennes, Gonde, Mons, Namur, liege, and at the last-named place, the measures are said to comprise eighty-three beds.f They produce annually more than seventy millions of quintals of coals, worth thirty millions of jfirancs ; and they employ about thirty-five thousand colliers.

In 1826 it was stated in the Atmales des Mines, that about forty departments were known to contain coal, and a list of the localities is given in that work.;}; Several of the deposits, hbwever, it was admitted, could scarcely be said to be more than known ; others

In Spain, charcoal is commonly nsed for fuel both in the kitchen stoveft npon which coHnary operations are perfonned, and in the lfraiero% or wanning pans, placed to air the dtting zooms. The mountains of New Castile, which are covered with noble trees, supply the inhabitants of the plidns and also the oital with charcoal for fiiel ; and it is common in the streets of Madrid to meet with asses bearing large panniers of this commodity, accompanied by a boy shouting " carbon ! carbon

f These localitiLes of foreign coal are mostly derived from Phillips and Conybeare, Dr. Ure, and Mr. De la Beche.

X Edin. Phil. Joum. toL ziv. pp. 252-257, where the account is translated ftom the Periodical abore dted.

2h2

468 Foreign Coal Deposits*

were worked to a small extent. The produce of tiro hundred and thirtj-six mines was estimated at that time, at from nine to ten millions of quintals annually, or about one-eighth of the yearly consumption of England. The number of miners employed is stated to have been, in 1826, about seven thousand. A strong prejudice, as elsewhere mentioned, existed, and still exists, against the use of pit coal for domestic purposes. Otherwise, it is stated, the mines in the department of Aveyron alone, might, from their ex- treme richness, have supplied the whole of France witb fuel J yet, the quantity annually extracted from them was only about ten thousand quintals ; and this from thirty different mines by superficial works conducted without any rule.*

According to the authority above quoted, there were in Belgium, in the neighbourhood of Mens, Charleroi, and liege, three hundred and fifty mines, giving employment to twenty thousand workmen and pro- ducing annually about twelve millions quintals of coal. In general, the coal seams are interstratified with beds of sandstone and schistose matter, similar to those which characterize the measures in our own country. They are, however, much more singularly contorted, especially at Anzin, near Valenciennes; the strata, being in some cases, apparently folded backward and forward, thus forming an enormous bale, half a league broad, and several leagues long." The mines, just without the gate of the city of Liege towards Brussels, are about one hundred and twenty

In France, about one tenth of the iron, i. e. 17,000 tons, is smelted with eoke; the other nine tenths, with charcoal. Wood being nsed for this, tf weU as for domestic purposes, in many parts of the country, the oonsninp- tion, as may be supposed, is immense : and not less than fifteen or sixteen miUions of acres are occupied by woods and forests.

Germany; Norway, Sweden. 469

fathoms deep : they are exposed to similar accidents from irruptions of water, fire damp, &c., to those in Great Britain. In 1812, owing to a sudden influx of the water, while one hundred and twenty-seven colliers were at work, seventy-four of the number, (the rest having escaped) were only saved, after sufiering dreadfully, by means of a communication cut to them from an adjacent drift, through a space of about one hundred and twelve feet. By the adoption of the Davy safety lamp, they early shared tlie advantages, and reiterated the gratitude of the pitmen of our own country.*

Germany contains several great deposits of coal, particularly in Saxony, Bohemia, and Silesia; the last-named province containing more than one hun- dred mines. In Austria, Tyrol, Bavaria, Hanover, the Hartz, and Hungary, there are mines of coal, though to what extent, or of what quality, we are not particularly informed. Thuringia is remarkable for the presence of a bituminous cupriferous schist, which contains a great quantity of fishes crushed, and even converted into a species of coal, which is occasionally

In Dr. Paiis's Life of Sir Hamphrj Davy, there is a notice of a pamphlet which appeared at Mons, in the year 1818, on the explosions that occur in coal mines, and on the means of preventing them hy Davy's Safety Lamp. It was published under the direction of the Chamber of Commerce and Manufactures of Mons, accompanied by notes, and by the result of a series of ezi>eriments that had been conducted by M. Crossart, President of the Chamber. The province of Hainault is said to be richer in coal mines than any other part of the Continent of Europe, and to have no less than one hundred thousand persons employed in the working them. The same kind of dangerous accidents occurred in these mines as in those of the north of England, and various expedients had been adopted for their prevention, which, however, availed but little in obviating them. All the precautions," observe the reporters, which had been hitherto known or practised, had not been able to preserve the unfortunate miners from the terrible effects of explosion. It is, therefore, an inappreciable benefit which we confer hy making known the equally simple and infallible method of preventing these accidents, which has been discovered by the celebrated Humphry Davj/'

470 Foreign Coal Deposits.

used for fuel ; thereby demonstrating the possibility of the carbonaceous transmutation of even animal matter ; a fact, indeed, of which we have evidence in our own country.* The Netherlands, it appears, owe their geological connexion with Germany, to a chain of carboniferous rocks.

Coal is comparatively rare in the north of £urope, as in Sweden and Norway — countries so rich ib mines of other kinds; they, however, abound with pine forests, so that fuel for the smelting of their ores is sufficiently abundant. In Poland, the coal measures are stated to repose on a black marble used in the arts : they contain numerous impressions of plants.

Mr. De la Beche quotes an authorily for the exist- ence of a rich carbonaceous deposit in the mountains which extend for a distance of 150 wersts, on the right bank of the Donetz, in Southern Russia. The coal is described as occurring in beds from a few inches to seven feet in thickness ; and as being bitu- minous among the sandstones and shales, but becom- ing anthracite where the rocks pass into grauwacke. Coal has been mentioned as wrought in Siberia.

There is said to be an abundance of excellent coal in China and Japan, some provinces in the Celestial Empire being as rich in this mineral as any countries in the world : of its quality and geological collocation, we have little information. Indiaf is by no means

The coal of Poictien, in Dauphiny, yields on diatiUalion a large quan- tity of ammonia. It contidns namerous sea shellB, and eren the bones of animals, to wlilch probably some of its substance is due. But as this does not occur in a genuine coal formation, it cannot be regarded as a true pit- coal. — Uret Geology f p. 168.

f The diamond is sd to hare been found in the Coal Formation of India— though not actually in the cool seams. It may be mentioned by the way, that in tenning coals Black Diamonds/* is often jocularly dona when spcaldng of the produce of our collieries, there is more propriety in

India Africa America. 471

deficient in coal; the most famous field is that of Damuda, discovered in 1815, and composed of yb rious beds of bituminous coal of good quality, alter- nating with shales, sandstone, &c.* At Ramjung colliery, eight beds, varying £rom four inches to nine feet, are worked. The coal is not, however, confined to these districts, but extends east and west of Da- muda to the distance of several hundred miles.f Coal is known to exist in the Island of Madagascar and also in Africa, though to what extent we are not informed.

America:|; contains some immense coal deposits,

the mppellati<m—68pedal]y when applied to aotiiracite, which contains eo large a proportion of carbon, than the nser may be aware. It will nata- nUj" Bays Dr. Kidd, excite the sarprise of those who are unacquainted with the chemical history of this substance, to leam that the purest diamond does not essentially differ fmm a particular variety of common cosL** — Physical Condiiion of jlfsn. Bridgewaier Treatises. Nor ib it nnwortliy of notice, that Dr. Brewster, In a communication to the Geological Society inclines to the opinion that the diamond itwlf may be of vegetable oilgin.

In the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal, for 1832, p. 847, there is table giving the results of several analyses of Asiatic and New Holland cosls, comprising thirty sorts, made at the Calcutta Assay Oi&oe, from which it would appear that most of the Indian coals are totally unfit for the purposes of maMng coke. The Burdwan coke, with the exception of ne specimen, would contain nearly a quarter of its weight of earthly impoiity ; 4he SilheC would be still worse ; the coal of Baghelpdr, (which Mr. Jameson seems to suspect is mistakenly called anthracite), would be nearly half earth; some of the mountain coal from Ava would yield a coke of better quality, but of very little density. The Chinese glance>coal alone forms a remarkable ex- ception to this unfavourable conclusion against Oriental coal, and deserves to rank at the head of the list in respect to its purity as a coke, although in specific gravity it does not come up to the ohaiacter of the English Aiel neither has it the spongy texture which contribates much to the glowing combustion of the latter.

f It is stated that among the MSS. left by the late Mjor James Franklin, F.GJ3., there is an account of the different beds of coal as well as of iron mines in the Central Districts of India.— Phil. Mag. July, 1835.

X The common fuel in the cities and towns of the United States, consists chiefly of wood, of which there are various kinds : the best is the celebrated hiccory tree, which commonly fetches a price equivalent to about twelve shillings per load; it is a durable lUel, and does not soon die out; oak billets are next in esteem, and sell for nine shilliDgs ; gum wood, dog wood, and

473 Foreign Coal Deposits.

ft

both of anthracite and the bitominous kinds. That great magazine of coal which shall hereafter be opened up for the supply of the United States, lies mostly under those vast plains or steppes extending from the western slope of the Alleghany mountains to what are called the '' Sand plains/' a distance of 1500 miles, and from the Northern lakes to the mouth of the Ohio, a width of nearly 600 miles. This immense tract embraces the States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, and parts of Pennsylvania, Viiginia, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Michigan, as well as a wild region of about 500 miles wide lying to the west of these States. Ac- cording to an American writer, '' The formatioiL of these plains is decidedly secondary, reposing on a horizontal limestone rock, the thick strata of which have never been penetrated. This limestone pan (as it is called), is generally but a few feet below the surface, and supports strata of bituminous coal and saline impregnations through almost its whole extent. The mineral resources of these plains are unbounded, and its coal-field nxndd cover JudfEurope. The coal is pure, lies above the river channels, and is easily worked. Iron and lead are also abundant." The measures occurring at Carbondale, Lehigh,']'

pine woody are an inferior description of firing, and fetch riz or acTen ahillingB the load, according to eircnmstances. The quantity to be accounted a load is fixed by law; and the logs, which are aboot four feet long on the cart, are sawn into short billets preTions to being piled in the cellars of the consumer, by the hawker of the fuel, or some person who accompanies hhn with a saw on his back. The poor mostly bum fagots, or pine wood. For charcoal, the wood of the tulip tree, {Uriodendron tulipifera) is much used in the United States.

Illinois Monthly Magazine.

f The Lehigh or Peach Orchard" coals, are stated to sell at Fhiladelphim at £1 lOs. per ton; in New York, and other distant places, the expenses of carriage increase the price of the commodity to about £2 per ton sterling.

Anthracite. 473

Lackawaxen Wilksbanre, and other places in the United States, are referred to the same era of depo- sition as the carboniferous series of Europe : the geological relations of the strata, however, differ, sometimes considerably, from what is observed in our British coal-fields. The organic remains, so far as lists of them have been published, generally resemble those which have been found in Europe. Fossil fish, preserved like those of the copper shale in Thuringia, and in the magnesian limestone of England, are found in the bituminous schists at Westfield, in Con- necticut, and at Sunderland, in Massachusetts. At Wilksbarre, the coal is mostly from twelve to fifteen feet thick — sometimes thirty or forty feet : it is inter- stratified with beds of shale and sandstone ; some of the latter being from five to one hundred feet in depth. The celebrated Anthracite of Pennsylvania extends, as we are informed by Mr. Eaton, along the foot of the Catskill Mountains, and is continued from the southern part of Pennsylvania to Sackett's Har- bour on Lake Ontario.* In Rhode Island, (Con- necticut,) has been found a quantity of Anthracite, with which Professor SiUiman has made comparative experiments, in reference to the Anthracite of Penn- sylvania.f He found that it gives out an equal

The Newcastle ooal sells on the average for about £3 per ton ; and the Lan- cashire canuel coal aboat lOs. additional at the above places. The dis- covery of coal in Pennsylvania has been the occasion of sudden good for- tune to some: one individual, who had a piece of land, for which he gave about one shilling sterling per acre, afterwards sold it for three hundred dollars per acre! The local appellation by which the coals are known, originated in the circumstance of their being brought to Philadelphia by the Lehigh canaL

Silliman's American Journal of Science, voL six.

f The terms anthracite and bituminous, as applied to coal, although indi- cating substances sufficiently distinct in different places, or at opposite ex- tremes of a caal field, may, nevertheless, apply very equivocally to inter-

474 Foreign Coal Deposits.

volume of inflammable gas, and bums without diffi- culty in furnaces built with fire-proof bri<. It bums with a considerable red flame and with a veiy intense heat Its colour is steel-grey, and much re- sembles plumbagine. The surface is sometimes covered with a thin pellicle of this substance ; and small particles of genuine plumbagine are accidentally met with among the schists which accompan j it. It sounds semi-metallic, and is somewhat of a datj structure.*

There is abundance of excellent coal, as well as iron, copper, and lead, in the colonies of Nova Scotia, Cape Breton, New Brunswick, and Australia. With

mediate masees, and more especially to the whole deposit In fact, a bed of ooal, that ii iometimea decidedly inflammable in one ntaadon, so far losei its bitumen in another, that the mass becomes almost altogether carbon. examples, the great coal deposit in ConnecUcat is sometimes called anthra- cite, and at others described as bitnminons, by American geologists. Mr. de la Beche states, that the continaona coal deposit of South Wales is sn- thracite in Pembrokeshire, and bitominoas in its eastern prolongation throogii Honmoathshire. Nor is the occnrrence of coal in contact with the primsiy locks confined to anthracite, the bituminous deposit of Viiginia rests on granite, and the coal series of France is, in some places, deposited on gndss, mica-slato, &c.

Although in most parts ot North America, the immense forests foimsh inexhaustible supplies of Aiel, it is far otherwise in many parts of South America, where, instead of trees, the forests — for so they may be called — consist of rast tracts ot grass, not, of course, arailable for economical firing; this is especially the character of the country about Buenos Ayres, wiiere there is scarcely a tree to be seen for many miles ; and from such a distance has /hel to be carried, that it has been affirmed there is scarcely a burden of fire-wood brought into that dty, which is not literally worth more than the beast which carries it While mentioning South America, it may be added, that in a work lately published by a Spaniard, there is a c<nparison between the produce of the gold and silrer mines of America and the coal mines of England, in which the author exhibits a balance in faTour of the latter, of no less than 329,500,000 francs annually ! And this without taking uito the account that almost entire destruction of the soil which generally takes place in the search after the precious metals in the new world ; while in Great Britain, the subterranean riches are extracted, where beautiful har- veste of golden grain, or verdant meadows, are conspicuous over nearly the entire tracts of operation.

Australia. 475

the working of the mines at the former place, import- ant commercial results will no doubt, at some future period, be identified : and, perhaps, the local author- ities have not regarded without suspicion, the geolo- gical surveys of the island which have been made by- individuals belonging to the United States. Williams, in his Mineral History, contended at great length for the expediency of Great Britain working the coal, which, in his time, was understood to abound in the island of Cape Breton, as well in order to raise reve- nue, as to diminish the quantity exported from this country to America and the West Indies.

Coal as weU as iron abound in the interior of Aus- tralia; the coal is not so bituminous as ours : it bums clearly and rapidly, and is getting daily more into demand at Sydney, accordingly as wood becomes more scarce. It can be had at the pits' mouth for five shillings a ton, but the expenses of carriage raise it to twenty shillings at Sydney. It was recently stated in the public journals, that a valuable discovery had just been noade by the Rev. Mr. Threlkeld, at Lake Macquaiiie, in the district of Reid's Mistake. He was about to bmld a chimney, with what he con- sidered to be a very fine black stone, which he had found in abundance in the neighbourhood of his dwelling : when, upon close examination, he ascer- tained it to be, what is called in England, cannel coal. Competent judges, it is stated, have declared the coal to be of very superior quality. The seam lies almost at the surface, and can, therefore, be worked at a trifling expense. First comes a layer of inferior coal, three feet thick; this is immediately succeeded by another layer of excellent quality, about five feet thick, and which, so we are assured by the

476 Foreign Coal Deposits.

report, can be taken up in solid masses of a yard square.

It may be added, that some of these rnote coal deposits have been on fire — perhaps occasioned by lightning : one recent instance has been already no- ticed ; and we are informed by the Abbe Raynal, that a seam of coal was once set on fire at Cape Bre- ton, which burned with great fury In the London and Edinburgh Philosophical Magazine, for August, 1832,f there is a description and sketch by the Rev. C. P. N. Wilton, of certain burning cliffs on the south- east line of coast near Newcastle, in Australia. This writer describes the cliffs as rising to the height of from one hundred to three hundred feet above the sea ; their surfaces presenting in some places, threes and in others, two parallel beds of coal of the inde- pendent formation." Large stems of arundinaceous plants in ironstone appear in great abundance between the horizontal beds of coal and the other strata. At no great distance from one of the cliffs on this coast, which was discovered, August, 1830, to have been on fire at no distant period, beneath a stratum of breccia, varying from eight to thirty feet in thickness, a bed of hrimm coal reposes, which passes into black, having immediately above it an accumulation of arundinaceous plants mixed with petrified wood.

Various species of fossilized wood, brown coal, or lignite, (sometimes, however, so perfectly bituminous and compact, as hardly to be distinguishable firom the true coal, but belonging to an era subsequent to that at which the "independent formation" took place,)

In the. coal fonnation on the banks of tho Mackenzie River, which ex- tends as far as 70 north lat. and supposed by Dr. Richardson to be identical with that in the county of Sutherland, in the north of Scotland.

f Page 93.

Lignites Or Fossil Wood. 477

occur in vast quantities in Europe and elsewhere serving, in some instances as valuable fuel. In the valleys of the Po, the Danube, in Switzerland, in the great basin of Paris, as well as in various other places, and comprehended among the tertiary forma- tions, there are immense beds of lignites, sometimes approaching to glance coal, of an excellent quality, and upon which pits are worked. This wood coal of various kinds, is much used in some parts of the Continent as fuel for ordinary purposes : and its frequent and abundant occurrence in situations re- mote from the true coal, give it a much more impor- tant relation to the wants and conveniences of the inhabitants of other countries than can well be con- ceived of, by merely regarding the value of analagous deposits in Great Britain.

Lignites occur abundantly in oolite passing into coal at Carpona, and in the island Veglia, where they are excavated for the use of the Trieste steam boat. The lignite mines of Buda, in Hungary, are re- markable for the supply of fuel which they afford. It seems to be admitted by Brongniart, that the sup- posed coal of the south of France is a lignite forma- tion. There are extensive mines of this substance in Provence, about Marseilles and Toulon, where twenty-eight beds are wrought. The principal depo- sit at Cologne is thirty feet thick : this is also the locality of the pulverulent variety so valuable in painting. Lignites abound at Soissons, Epemay, Laon, St. Paulet, and some other places in France. To the lignite above the chalk, are supposed to belong those immense deposits found in the middle of the Alps, and those of Styria, mined for fuel.

Ure*B Geology, p. 173.

478 Foreign Coal Deposits.

In 1828, a large mass of fossil wood was dis- corered upon one of the ulphs of the Danube, named Yalpong, in the lower part of Bessarabia, and opposite the town of Belgrade. This fossil was cob- sidered likely to become of importance to that part of Russia, now entirely deprived of forests. The lignite is in the form of fossil masses, of a greyish coloor, but passing, in the lower portions, into a deep blacL In the upper parts, are found quantities of the d&ffU of wood, coTered with bark, white, thick, and firiable ; the pieces pressed one upon another, and intermixed with the husks of grain (casses de cMales). Th wood, according to the discoverer, Mr. lichfeldt, w that of the lime tree. It lies nearly horizontal be- tween coarse sand and calcareous clay ; the first m the form of a wall, and the latter serving as a roof, in which many shells occur. The sand is separated from the stratum of lignite by about six inches of a resinous clay, in the lower part of which a great number of shells of different sorts are found.

Index.

Aberdeenshire, peat moss of, 47. AcoessiblenesB of coal, 113, n. Act of Trade, 437. Adits, 189.

Adipocire found in peat, 48. AAer-damp, 226. Africa contains coal, 471. Agency of fire in converting vege- . ,. ' table matter into coal, 77. Alentopteris vulgatior, 101. Alston Moor, limestone of, 37. American coal deposits, 473. Ammonia, 409, 470. Attimala in Goal rocks, 106. Antholiihes, 106. Anthracite, 344, 396 472, 473 ;

contains traces of regetable

matter, 83. Anthocolheriam, 107, n. Apprehensions on descending a

coal mine, 223. Arborescent grasses, 91. Arborescent coke, 414. Arrowsmith's man, 112. Arundinaceotts plants, 91, 476. Ashby-de-la-Zouch, 116, 146. Assodations of pitmen, 299. Asterophyllites, 100. Atchaialaya river, its enoraums

raft, 72. Australia, 474, 476. Ayrshire coal field, 118.

Backs or dines, 243. Baff and pay weeks, 291.

Baff of inflammable air, 280. BaOycastle, coal at, 121. Baltic trade, 460. Barrow gate, 214. Banksman, 201, 207. Basaltic dyke, 162, 164. Basins, coal, 1 14, 122 ; sections of,

124 ; south Welsh, 126. Basket corves, 207. Beaumont's paroxysmal periods,

Beaumont seam, 134. Beche, H. T. de la, his Geology,

Bedworth, coal mines at, 146. Beighton, his contrivance, 197, n. Bell moulds, 248. Belturbet, coal at, 121. Belgium, coal works in, 468. Benefit Societies, 301. Benks or banks, 214, 216. Bennet and Tyerman's voyage, 8. Benwell main seam, 134 ; ooai for*

merly on fire at, 246. Bensham seam, 188, 248, n. Bewick, Mr., 290. Birmingham, supply of coal to,

Bitumen, 403. Bituminous shale, 342, n. Bhick coal, 332. Blasting, 184, 190, 246,280. Blenkinsopp colliery, 128. Blowers, 229, 266. Blond metal, 166.

Imdbx.

Board gates, 214.

Bodies preserved in peat, 49.

Bog fuel, fondness for, 56.

Bolden Book, 910.

Bonnet case, 214, n.

Boring, 172, 176, 177.

Bovey coal, 60, 64, 212, 331; composition of, 68.

Bouhon and Watt, 108.

Bradley mine, 216, 235.

Branch coal, 333.

Branching coke, 414.

Brandling, Mr. on exportation of coal, 442.

Breakage of coal, 381.

Bright beads, 243, 249.

Bristol coal field, 113.

Brora coal, 118.

Brown coal, 67, 331, 476.

Brush iron ore, 155.

Buckland, Dr. on exportation, 445.

Buddie, Mr., his synopsis of coal seams, n. 138; on ventilation, 222; on creeps, 237; confers with Sir H. Davy, 271 ; his opinions on the safety lamp, 280 ; on the London coal trade, 430; recommends a tax on hearths, 432 ; on waste of coal, 434 ; on free exportation, 440.

fuming cliffs, 476.

Burning well, 405.

Bttttey and Doggey, 295.

Byker, 197.

Cactuses, 91, 105.

Caking coal, 341.

Calamites Steinhaueri, 106.

Caloric, 2.

Cannel coal, 148, 333, 343.

Capital employed on the Tyne, 327.

Carbonaceous group, 38.

Carbonic acid gas, 70.

Cardiff, 395.

Carron iron works, 119.

Carville colliery, 204.

Casts of yegetables, 88.

Cauldron bottoms, 248.

Cellular structure, 109.

Chains, 201, Chain pumps, 195.

Charooal fossil, 78, n.

Charring tuif, 65.

Charter to Newcastle, 310.

Chemical combinations, 4.

Choke damp, 226.

Civil wars, 316, 327, 363, 437.

Clackmannanshire baMn, 124, 152.

Clarence pit, 233.

Clunch, 139.

Clyde vale coal basin, 123,

Coal, of vegetable origin, 34,58; internal structure of, 93; natu- ral history of, 57; supposed ani- mal origin of, 59 ; not known to the ancients, 306; wrought bj Britons, ?08; varieties of; 331.

Coal ashes, 339, 415.

Coal balls, 397.

Coal Exchange, 385. i.

Coal vegetables, 70 ; required a hot ' and humid climate, 88; of la- custrine origin, 73; their cha- ,. racter in the strata of Newcastle, , 1 Durham, and Yorkshire, 73.

Coal districts of England, 1 12.

Coal trade, 315, 317, 361, 367.

Coal tar, 406.

Cobbett, his ludicrou8blunder,24 1 .U

Cognomens, singular, 299.

Coke, 424, 326, 410.

Colliers, the, 287 ; formerly chain- ed to the pits, 288. Ik.

Colliers and sailors, 287, ti.

Colebrook-dale works, 325.

Colouhoun on ironstone, 155, n.

Cooling theory, 285.

Combustion, agents of, 14.

Compound ventillation, 220.

Conductors, 208.

Conflagrations, spontaneous, 4, n.

Connaugfat coal district, 121.

Contorted strata, 130, 468.

Conveyance of coal, 346.

Conybeare on causes now in ope- ration, 26.

Copperas works, 400.

Corfe, 201, 207, 357.

Cornish miners, 289.

Cornish steam engines, 418.

Counterpoise, 203.

Coursing the air, 222 .

Craigleith fossil tree, 93, 97, 104.

Creeps, 236.

Creashy bleas, 249.

Cribbing, 181.

Crib, or cradle, 209.

Criminals condemned to mines, i/

Index.

Cioyden, 311. Crushes, or creeps, 236. Culinary fires, 9. Culm, 152, 336, 396. C ulross chalder, 119. Cnmberland ore, 155. Cupriferous schist, 469. Cutters, 244. y Cuyier's theory, 26. Cycadites lanceolatus, 90.

Dayy's theory of heat, 2; his ex- amination of fire damp, 270.

Dayy lamp, 239; its safety, 281,

Day level, 189.

Denmark, exportation to, 448; impost duties in, 449. —denominations of coal, 338. Denudations, 164, 175.

Derbyshire coal field, 116.

Diagonal workings, 229.

Diagram of creeps, 238.

Diamond, 470.

Dicotyledonous vegetables, 102.

Dip and rise, 193.

Dirt band, 143.

Dislocations of strata, 131, 157,

Diyiningrod, 174, n.

Donald Ros8 292.

Donations of coal, 314, 315, i.

Downcast and upcast pits, 218.

Dragon tree, 92.

Draininff, 193.

Dreadful accident at Felling, 264.

Dredging for coal, 360, n.

Dress of the pitmen, 298. i Drifts, 189.

Drift wood, 71.

Dromagh colliery, 153.

Dwellings of the pitmen, 292.

Du Bartas, extract from, 7.

Dudley coal field, 114.

Durham coal field, 116, 458, 463.

Duties on coal, 317, 362, 369, 375, 390, 393, 395, 432.

Dyke, Saltom, 161; Great trap, 162; Whin sill, 162.

Dykes, upthrow and downthrow, 159, 161 ; their uses, 166.

Earth, internal temperature of, 22.

Engine pit, 194.

Euphorbites vulgaris, 96.

Exnaustion of our coal, 462.

Expenses of sinking, 186, 189.

Exportation of coals, 313 ; objec- tions to, 439.

Export duties, 436,442,447; re- pealed, 449.

Explosions, 226, 231, 242.

Fairholmes's theory, 33, n. ; on the

deposition of coal yegetables,

75, n. Faults, 131, 158 ; advantages of,

Felling Colliery, described, 223;

recent crystals obtained there,

235 ; explosion at, 256. Females in ooal pits, 242. Ferns, abundant in English coal

measures, rare in Scottish, 74. Fields, coal. 111. Fifeshire coal field, 118, 444. Filicites, 95. Fir cone, 92. Fire, definition of, 1. Fire worshippers, 10. Fires in coal mines, 254. Fire damp, 225 ; composition of,

271 ; generation of, 271, n. Fishes, fossil, 106, 469. Fitters, 312, 360, 363, n., 375. Flat rope, 202. Floated veffetables, 73. Flying reed, 143. Footrail or futteril, 210, 233. Foreign coal formation, 465. Foreign ooal trade, 435, 448. Forest of Dean, 114. Formation, the coal, 110. Formations, Geological, 37. Fossil organic bodies, 86, 466. Fossil Reliquia, Steinhauer's, 94. Fossil Florals, 89 ; of Count Stem- berg, 89; of lindley and Hut- ton, 99. Fossil wood, 478. Fragrance, a prelude to explosion,

256, n. France, 446, 467; trade to, 437,

452 ; import duties in, 451. Friction or collision, 4, 8. Fuci, coal derived from, 81. Fuels, 14.

Imdsx.

Funguses in coal nines, 234. Furnace, 219, 224.

Gauister fossils, 96.

Ganistercoal, 161.

Garland circle, 182.

Gas, hydrogen, 271,282, 404,400, 442; non-inflammaUe tluoogh small apertures, 272.

Geognostic epochs of Brongniart,

Geology, attiactiveness oi 17 ; im- portance of, 19.

Geological maps of Smith aad Greenhough, 174.

Geological £)ciet7 founded, 30.

Geimany, ooal in, 409.

Getting the coal, 232.

Gibbet at Jarrow, 304.

Gilmerton Collieiy, 242, n.

Gin, 186.

Ginging or walling, 181.

Glance ooal, 336.

Glass, manufacture of, 420.

Gloucestershire coal field, 113.

Gosforth colliery, 130.

Grades among colliers, 294.

Granitic conntries, 36.

Griff, coal mines at, 146, 197.

Grindstones, 310j 327.

Hatchett's experiments, 00. Hatfield, turf moors 47. Head rear, 180, 201, 202. Heat, definition of; 2. Hewing, 246, HeworUi band, 137, n. Heworth chapel yard, 206. Hirings, 293. Holland, exportation to, 441 ; im<

port duties in, 460. Hollingshead's Chronicle, 318. Holing under, 244, 249. Home consumption, 47, 416, 442, Horse gate, 213. Horse gin, 186. Horses in coal mines, 241. Hostemen or Oastmen, 313, 338

n., 301. Howgill Colliery, 212, n. Human fossil remains, 23. Humidity, effecU of, 78. Huntingdon, Re?. W., 289. Hurriers, 241.

Button, Dr., 289.

Hutton, W., obeervatioBs on gmQ,

Hypothetical queries, 69.

Igneous action, evideaoes of, 105. Inclined plane, 227. Inclined strata, 130, 104. Indications of ooal, 176. Indies, ooal in, 471. Infinitessimal period, 20, iBflammable gas, 226, 230, 246. Inglehy the conjuror, 289. Intelligence oC colliers, 291 . Interstratified peat, 60, 62. Ireland, 444. Iridescent coal, 332, Irish coal fields, 119. Irish coal trade, 389, 396. Irish turf digging, 63. Iron, 164, 402, 422. Iron man, 240. Iron trade, 322. Iron tubbing, 183. Iron tubs for coal, 207. Jamieson on Cuvier's theory, 27. Jarrow Colliery, 138, 223. Jet, 336, n., 398.

Keels, 314, 369.

Kendrew," a drama, 260, n.

Kerving, 244.

King, Dr., on peat, 46.

Kirwan, on coal, 69.

Lamarck's theory, 23. Lanarkshire coal field, 118. Lancashire coal field, 116. Lardner, Dr., on heat, 43. Lavoisier's theory of heat, 2. Leeds, collieries at, 426. Leges Burgorum, 310. Lehigh coal, 344 472. Leinster coal district, 120. Leith glass works, 421. Lennd braes fosal, 104. Lcnpidodendron tselatum, 96 ;

Stembergii, 98; oboTatum, 96. Level bearing, 194. Lightning, a source of fire 4;

strata fired by, 264. L]gnite,29,04,477. Limestone, 128, 140, 173. Liverpool coal trade, 429.

,

Inbbx.

London ooal iraiie, 310, 317, 373, 378,384,387,430,431.

London, depth of coal beneath,

Long and ihort woiic, 212.

LotUan ooal fields, 118.

Lower coal, itt supposed marine origin, 60.

Low Main coal, 136.

Lycopodia, 27, 465.

Lyelrs Geology, 18.

Machinery, working, 191. Magistrate, murder of, 304. Mammett's geological facts, 100. Man, a fire making animal, 1 1 . Manchester, supply of coal to, 424. Mantle shaped strata, 126. Manufacturing coal, 339. Mar, Earl of, his collieries, 96. Marine vegetation, 79; not found

in the coal measures, 80, n. Market names of coal, 338. Materia pinguis, 87. Matter, early existence f, 25, n. Measures, coal, ill, 129. Medals of creation, 86. Moiraee' machine, 206. Menzies on yentillation, 229. Merthyr Tydril, 341. Metallurgy, fires used for, 0. Meters and meleorage, 376, 380,

Metropolitan iiiMBts, 869. Milles, Dr., on Ayrey coal, 65. Mineral discofes, pleasure of

maldng, 179. Mineral tallow, 47. Mine on fire, 261. Mining, leoords of, 183, n. Moiia celery, 146. Monkwearmouth colliery, 187. MonoeotyledononsvegetahkSylOB. Mosaic and mineral gmogies, 20. Mount Cullun, 122. Munnnies used for fiael, 16. Muujlter coal &trict, 120. Muscle band, 107.

Narrow or knff work, 216. Neptunlsts and PhitonisiB, 6. Neuropteris, 100, 101. Newcastle ooal trade, 438, 466. Newcastle museum, 97, 183.

New Holland coals, 471, n. Ninety fathom dyke, 162. Noah's flood, 20, n., 31, n. North Stafibrdshire coal field, 116. North Welsh ooal field, 115. Northumberland coal field, 116,

458, 463. Nottingham ooal field, 116. Nova Scotia, 474.

Old wif(8 low, 46.

Open burning ooal, 15, 341, 396,

Organic- remains, 473. Orrel coal, 430. Outcrop of the coal, 174.

Palms, 91.

Pairs of pits, 200.

Paris, his life of Davy, 269, n.

Parkinson on peat, 45.

Parliamentary committees, 338, 364, 379, 388, 396, 440, 443.

Parrot coal, 334.

Partings in the coal, 243.

Peacodc coal, 333, n.

Peat, eariy use of, 40; natural history of, 43.

Peat bogs, 43; contain iron and copper, 50; not die origin of ooai, 61, 81 ; localities of, 62.

Pellat Mr. on glass, 42.

Penn, Granville, his opinions, 30.

Perkins, Mr. on London coal trade ,

Petroleum, 401.

Phanerogamie plants, 105.

Phlogiston, 2.

Phytolithes, 94, 105.

Pillars of ooal, 216; paxtia work- ing o( 286.

Pines, 91.

Pits, sizes and forms of, 180 ; Farer's list of; 146.

Pit coal, 58.

Pitmen, undergronnd appearance of, 240.

Pit mouth cover, 206.

Fidi lake, 403.

Plan of a coal wcd213.

Plants, fossil species of, 86.

Plate pvesent to Sir H. Davy,

Poland, 470.

Indbz.

Portugal, eotl in, 407; import

duties in, 461. Pdttery works, 419. Prejudioes against pit oca], 821,ii. Prns gangs, 306. Preston How, seams at, 146. Preston Grange ooUierj, 189. Primeval vegetation, 70, 104. Probable duration of our coal, 464. Prohibition of ooal in London, 321. Props or puncheons, 214. Pkoleotorate, 364. Pseado royal filidte, 100. PulTerized ooal. 399. Pomping cylinders, 198. Putters, 227, 241. Pyrites, 264, 342, 400, 401.

Quantity of ooal unwrougt, 466; Professor Sedgwick on, 467; Mr. Bakewell on, 400.

Railroads, 363, 366.

Religion, fire used in, 9.

Religion among the colliers, 290.

Rents or fissures, 168.

Rhizomorphea phosphoroB, 234, n.

Richmond shilling, 317.

River and coast dues, 371.

Romans used coal, 308.

Roman way, ooal found under,

Roof and floor, 214, n.

Rotherham, collieries at, 233, ii., 423; ooal fired at, 264,

Rotheihaifi red rock, 147.

Russia contains coal, 470; export- ation to, 440.

i/Siafety lamp, 268, 276.

Sale of coals by weight, 382, 386,

Schuylkill ooal, 83.

Scotch coal fields, 118 ; trade,

Screening apparatus, 200.

Sea coal, 311,368.

Seaweed used for fuel, 16.

Sections of strata, at Newcastle, 133; at Dudley, 139; near Bilston, 141 ; at Whitehaven, 144 ; near Halifax, 149.

Sedgwick Professor, on unwrought coal, 457.

Shaft, expenses of skASag, 186.

Shale, 166.

Shattery roof; 248.

Sheffield, collieries about, 148;

supplies of ooal to, 847, 367,

Shera used for Ibel, 16. Shells, occurrence of, 160, n. Sheth, 224. Shiits or slips, 169. ShObotUe CoUieiy, 128. Shipment of coals, 376. Shipping staith, 361. Shropshire coal field, 114. SigilJaria, 96, 97. Silesia, 4U37.

Silliman on day and night, 23, Simple ventilation, 219. Slate ooal, 332. Smith, Mr. W., 39. Smoke, 343, 416. Society for preventing accidents

in mines, 270. Somersetshire ooal field, 113. Soot, 416. South America, 474. South Stafibrdshire ooal field, 1 14. South Welsh ooal field, 114, 162,

469,462. Spain, coal in, 466. Spedding, Mr., 212. Sphagnum, or bog-moss, 46. Sphenopteiis crenata, 101. Spontaneous oombttstion,264,334. Stafiordshire petition, 283. Staiths or drojps, 348. St Anthon's Colliery, 137. Steel mills, 240.

Steam engines, 197, 339,346, 417. Steinhauer's Foeol Reliquia, 94. Stigmaria Ficoides, 99 and tu Stockton, 329.

Stoves, and hot- water heating, 13. Stephenson, Mr., 289. Stick or strike, 302. Stoppings, 226. Strata at Bovey, 66. Streets upon bare coal, 164. Stythe, 226, 267. Submarine forest, 76.- Submarine workings, 144. Submerged wood, 63. iT Sun, a source of fire, 4. Sunderiand, 327, 372, 438, 466.

Indbx.

Sweden, import duties in, 449. Swilleys, 128. Synthetical results, 61.

Tabular Tiew of strata, 3tf. Tanfield, 339. Ten yard coal, 139, 235. Thaius of the pitmen to Sir H.

Davj, 276. Thuringia, 469. Tippler, 347. Toads in stone, 107; experiments

on, 108, and n. Tools of the sinker, 181; of the

collier, 243. Tram, 207, 227. Traps, 131. Trap roclES, 159. Trappers, 193, n. Trap doors, 225, Tree ferns, 91. Tubal Cain, 13. Tubs used in sinking, 180. Tubbing, 182. Turbaries, ancient, 43. Turf, digging and drying, 53;

varieties of, 54; oonsidmd as

a fuel, 54. TynesaUors, 365.

Vascular cryptogamic plants, 104. /iegetable origin of coal, 82. Yentillation, 192,217. Vertical fossil stems, 93. Vertical strata, 130, n. Verticillate plants, 91. Vis plastica, 87. Volkmannia distichia, 101. Ulster coal district, 121. Underground works, 211; acci- dents, 247; steam engines, 199. Unexplored localities, 117.

Waggons, 208, 227, 316,350, 352,

Waggons drawn by colliers, 297.

Walling or ginging, 181.

Wallsend, evolution of gas at, 229; dreadful explosion at,267 ; coal, 339.

Warmth, fires used for, 9.

Warwickshire coal field, 114.

Waste of coal, 433.

Wastes, 225.

Water, irruptions of 249, 251.

Water bucket drawing, 206.

Wayleaves, 349.

Weight of coals, 382.

Welsh coal field, 115,394; ana- lyses of coals, 341.

Welsh coal trade, 394.

Werner's system, 53.

Werner and HutUm, 21.

Whimsey, 202.

Whin dyke, 165, n.

Whingill, strata at, 145.

Whippers, 376, 385.

Whiston, his theory, 4.

Whitby coal plants, 89.

Whitehaven coal field, 1 16, 130.

Willey Brown's iron man, 246.

WiUiams on exportation, 443.

Windlass, 180.

Windmill pumps, 196.

Winning tne coal, 211.

Wire-gauze guard, 273.

Witham on fossil coal, 60, 102.

Woman found in peat moss, 48.

Woodward on extraneous fossilsi

Woods, decay of, 319.

Wood fuel, 472.

Works of art under peat, 44 n.

Wreck produced by boring, 177.

Yorkshire coal fields, 116. Yuccites, 92.

Zamia, 91.

Th£ End.

Shrpield :

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