Peculiarities lately found in Iron-Jlone* 35 



to the adjacent country, and the neighbouring towns and vil- 

 lages, who employ their privileges to the fulleft extent, are a 

 great impediment to the cultivation of timber. 



The iron-ftone for this work is procured chiefly from the 

 neighbouring principality of Ifenberg-Birftein, and in par- 

 ticular from "the diftridt of Wenings, near which there have 

 long been a great many large iron-ftone works. In all thefe 

 the iron-ftone is found in ftrata; and the ftrata in general 

 are only from four or five inches to one foot in breadth ; but 

 in the above-mentioned principal work they are fometimes 

 from one to two fathoms in breadth, but at prefent they have 

 decreafed to two or three feet. The iron-ftone dug Up from 

 the different pits, and employed at the Lilienftern work, is 

 in part compact brown iron-ftone, and partly brown hematite, 

 which is found for the moft part in pretty round hard pieces 

 without much variation. It is exceedingly argillaceous, and 

 fo difficult to be fufed, that it requires a confiderable addition 

 of calcareous (tone, a large quantity of whieh is found in the 

 county of Wachterhbach. In this diftrict, at prefent, the 

 work has only a few iron-ftone pits, none of which are of 

 much importance: one of them, however, on account of the 

 ftn^ular metallurgic property of the iron-ftone it produces, 

 deferves the attention of mineralogifts. 



Under the exterior cruft there firft occurs a ftrong ftratum 

 of white and red fandftone in alternate order, which extends 

 to the diftance of feveral miles in the neighbourhood. Under 

 this lies a grav argillaceous ftone, which feels fomewhat greafy, 

 foft, and friable, and is fcarcely three inches in thicknets : be- 

 low this there is a ftratum of excellent iron-ftone of equal 

 thicknefs, the bottom of which confifts of folid fandftone, of 

 a kind of millftone which frequently occurs in thefe diftricts. 

 This iron-ftone is different from every other kind in the 

 neighbourhood : it is a compact argillaceous iron-ftone of a 

 reddifh brown colour and of a rough fracture, fometimes 

 mixed with (hells, among which there is found, though very 

 feldom, a variety which has a fibrous fracture, with an al- 

 moft metallic fplendour, and feems worthy of further exa- 

 mination. 



When I viflted this work, fome mafTes of this compact 

 iron-ftone were dug up which contained charcoal. This 

 charcoal was found loofe in the iron-ftone, and partly grown 

 into its fubftance and adhering to it. By what natural or 

 artificial fire this charcoal was burnt, and by what lingular 

 revolution it was carried to the depth of from three to four 

 fathoms, and there io intimately combined with the iron- 



C % ftone 



