THE QUARTERLY 
JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 
OCTOBER, 1866. 
I. OUR COAL SUPPLIES AND OUR PROSPERITY. 
With a “ Coal Map” of the World. 
In the year 1862, Mr. Edward Hull, of the Geological Survey, 
published a small compact work on the coal-fields of Great Britain, 
in which he incidentally discussed the question “ How long will 
our Coal-fields last ?” and replied by expressing his belief that they 
would last upwards of 1,000 years, at the then rate of production. 
In 1863, Sir Wm. Armstrong, the President of the British Associ- 
ation, in his address at Newcastle, took up the inquiry in what was 
at that time considered rather a sensational spirit, and declared the 
probable limit of the coal-fields to be about two centuries. 
In 1865, Mr. W. 8. Jevons, M.A., published a work on the 
“Coal Question,” with “an inquiry concerning the progress of the 
nation, and the probable exhaustion of our coal supply ;” in which 
he said, “ If our consumption of coal continue to multiply for 110 
years at the same rate as hitherto, the total amount.of coal con- 
sumed in the interval will be one hundred thousand millions of 
tons ;’ and as Mr. Hull, whose figures he adopted, only estimated 
the whole available resources of the country at about eighty thou- 
sand millions of tons, there is, according to Mr. Jevons’s view, a 
fair prospect of our supply being entirely stopped within a century. 
When the startling work of Mr. Jevons was given to the world, 
the sensation created by Sir Wm. Armstrong’s remarks at New- 
castle had somewhat subsided, and the book was neglected until 
Mr. J. 8. Mill, the political economist, took up the subject of the 
reduction of the national liabilities in the House of Commons last 
spring. He did not exactly say that he agreed with Mr. Jevons’s 
calculations, but he gave them sufficient weight to justify their 
employment: for the end he had in view, and his argument may 
thus be briefly stated: “ We are fast consuming the stock-in-trade 
of our posterity ; do not let us bequeath them our debts.” 
The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Gladstone) ae this a 
VOL. III. I 
