Ab Englishmen, we must all feel an interest In that branch of industry which, perhaps, 

 more than any other, has contributed to our national fame, furnishing us with the 

 groundwork as it were of our wealth, our strength, and our civilization. The fact that 

 so many thousands of our working-men with their wives and families have for many 

 years derived and stUl derive their subsistence, either from above or from under- 

 ground labour, over this wide tract of mountain and valley, is of itself sufficiently impor- 

 tant ; but when we add to this that colossal fortunes have here been gathered together 

 to be dispersed again thoroughout the breadth of Her Majesty's dominions, and that 

 whilst suppljing her subjects with the metal needed for machinery of every kind, for 

 engines, railway tracks, and numberless works of art and industry, ranging from an 

 ironclad to a saucepan, the produce of this indispensible material has conferred a 

 signal benefit on the world at large, we cannot fail to be impressed with a true estimate 

 of the gigantic interests involved, and to feel that a few hours spent in inquiring uito the 

 modui operandi followed at such works as those of Pontjiiool, may be well and profitably 

 employed. I enhsted the kind services of Mr. David Lawrence, one of our members, best 

 acquainted with the genius loci, and of Dr. McCullough, whose faculty for organising a 

 pleasure party is only equalled by his alacrity to promote the enjojTnent of his friends. 

 Together we made a preliminary siu-vey of the ground and of the works at the Race, enga- 

 ging the goodwill of Mr. Williams and Mr. Green, superintending agents, who so ably duected 

 our movements on the day of meeting. On application to Mr. Abraham Darby, I obtained his 

 cordial permission for a descent en masse upon the premises, and his instructions were 

 given to his agents that every facility should be afforded to us for a complete view of all 

 objects of interest in connection with the works. Besides this provision for the mental 

 alimentation of my colleagues of this club, I had a capital jpiici de resistance in reserve 

 in the promised assistance of Mr. W. Adams, C.E., President of the Cardiff Club and a 

 member of ours, to meet us at the Clarence with his invaluable collection of carboniferous 

 fossils, plans and sections of the coal field, and, better than all, a vivd voce demonstration 

 of its more salient features. Thus forearmed I felt tolerably assured of the success of 

 the Pontypool meeting, and my hopes were not disappointed. On starting from the 

 Pontypool-road Junction, we passed over railway and turnpike road to dip nito the valley, 

 which we ascended for some distance on the left bank of the Avon, mider the overhanging 

 woods of the Park, guided by Mr. Lawrence, who wished to obtain the opinion of the 

 Club on a discovery of his own. He had employed some men to expose a section of lime- 

 stone conglomerate in the Old Red ; this proved to be, as expected, a bed of comstone, not 

 differing essentially in appearance or in lithological structm-e with many others known to us 

 throughout the wide expanse of the Old Red formation, extending from the Monmouthshire 

 basin to the Malvern hills. From this point, crossing the Avon — at times a mere brook, 

 at others a turbid mountaui ton-ent, according to the amount of rainfall prevailing — we 

 ascended the right bank within view of the town of PontiTJOol ; here on a grass-covered 

 elope we delayed for a time to contemplate the scenery, grand and smiling at the same 

 time, high and barren mountains closing in a valley of picturesque outlme, the side of the 

 latter, opposite to where we stood, clothed with the fine timber, and carpeted with the 

 verdure of Pontypool park. We could not help regretting that so much of the beauty of 

 the scene should be obsciured by rain clouds, made all the more mrrky by the heavy smoke 

 of burning chimney stacks, features which, indispensible though these be here, certainly 

 lend no additional charm to the else fair face of nature. Here we transacted the formal 

 business of the Club, which was dispatched currente calamo, and we lost no time in 

 working our upward way to the lowermost quarry in Cwm-ynys-cau, where a fine section 

 of the carboniferous limestone came into view. Beds varying in thickness from 1-ft. 6-in., 



