1904 J A Woman's Visit to a Peat Bog, 175 



We were sheltered in the railway station durin*^ a sharp 

 storm of rain, thunder and lit^htning, which had no effect on our 

 spirits, and the evening- train brought us back to Ottawa shortly 

 after six in the evening-, tired, but happy, with very pleasant 



memories of our Canadian peat bog. 



M. xMcK. S. 

 Ottawa, Oct. 31, 1903. 



The following description of the manufacture of fuel from 

 peat has been furnished by Mr. D. B. Dowling, of the Geological 

 Survey of Canada : 



Experiments in Canada in the manufacture of peat have been 

 carried on for many years, but were mainly unsuccessful because 

 the attempts to drive off" the moisture had been limited to mechan- 

 ical means. Air drying, a long process, produces a fuel in which 

 there is an average of 30 per cent of moisture. A quicker means 

 of getting rid of the water is imperative, but the expense of 

 mechanical pressure combined with other difficulties have led to 

 the abandonment of that method. In some of the localities where 

 the manufacture of peat fuel is going on, the process followed con- 

 sists of partial drying, by first draining the bog which removes 

 only the water which accumulates in the trenches and then partial 

 air drying on the surface, to be followed by artificial drying by the 

 application of heat either before or after the fashioning into bricks 

 or bars. 



Draining the bog allows of the transport of the material by 

 portable tramways to the works and the partial drying of the 

 surface. In wet bogs the transport is by water in barges, and 

 when the work is on a large scale the digging is by dredges. At 

 Beaverton the peat is dried in a rotary furnace and when in an 

 apparently dry state pressed into bricks. The plan adopted at 

 Newington is, for the initial stage, to dig the peat by a German 

 machine which cuts out a vertical section by means oi' a box-like 

 spade being forced down into the bed. This, on being lifted 

 brings up with it the block cut out. The transport to the works 

 is by means of an endless wire cable working in a trough, up 

 which the peat is pushed by the carriers attached. It then falls 

 into a hopper leading to the mixing machine, something like -jl 



