120 Progress in Science. (January, 
by compressed air ; and during the meeting he gave many of the members an 
opportunity of seeing it at work in his pits at West Ardsley. Mr. Firth’s 
machine has already been described in this Journal, and we have also noticed 
his efforts to promote the introduction of coal-getting machinery by offering 
some time ago a premium for the best form of machine. 
At the same meeting, Dr. W. J. Clapp described the ‘“ Universal Coal- 
Cutting Machine,” used at Nant-y-glo; this machine is driven by compressed 
air, but has the action of a borer rather than that of a pick. Mr. J. Plant, of 
Leicester, read a paper ‘‘On the Burleigh Rock Drill,” and two examples of 
the drill were actively at work in the yard of the Church Institute, close to 
the room occupied by the Mechanical Section. 
A new form of safety-lamp has been described before the North of England 
Institute of Mining Engineers, by Mr. Emerson Bainbridge, of Sheffield. 
The light is protected by a cylinder of glass below and of brass above, so that 
wire-gauge is scarely used in its construétion. 
‘‘ The Application of Compressed Air to Underground Haulage” was the 
title of a paper lately read before the Dudley Institute of Mining Engineers, 
by Mr. A. J. Stevens, of Newport, Monmouthshire. After comparing the cost 
of using steam-power underground with that of applying the steam to the 
compression of air, he described a small and apparently simple winding- 
engine, which he has recently patented, with the view of dispensing with 
animal power for underground haulage. 
Deposits of coal, almost unrivalled in magnitude, are described by Baron 
Von Richtofen as existing in certain provinces in China. Whilst in the 
maritime provinces the coal-measures have been in some places completely 
removed by denudation, and in others only imperfe&ly preserved, some of the 
inland provinces are singularly favoured, and exhibit fine exposures of their 
coal-bearing rocks. The province of Shansi contains at least 30,000 square 
miles of coal-producing ground, occupied partly by a fine bituminous coal and 
partly by anthracite. Some of the coal-seams are said to attain a thickness 
of 30 feet. In fact China offers to the miner coal-fields which are said to 
rival, if not to surpass, even those of the United States. 
A description of the iron-ores of the Bidasoa, in the Pyrenees, by Dr. 
Rohrig and Mr. Haas, has appeared in a recent number of the ‘‘ Chemical 
News.” The mineral seems to be chiefly spathose ore, or carbonate of iron, 
superficially changed by atmospheric influences into a brown iron ore, or 
hydrous peroxide. From the published analyses the ores appear to contain 
more or less manganese; and, as no phosphorus is recorded, they would 
probably produce a pig-iron remarkably well adapted for conversion into 
Bessemer steel. The ores occur in highly-inclined lodes, coursing for the 
most part through syenite, though some of the lodes are found in adjacent 
Silurian rocks and others in Triassic limestones. 
In the Island of Anglesey a valuable deposit of copper-ore has long been 
worked at the Parys Mountain, but it is a disputed point whether this 
represents the only great treasury of mineral wealth in that island, or whether 
copper-lodes sufficiently rich to be worked are not widely distributed. It 
consequently becomes a matter of interest to notice any local vestiges of old 
copper workings in this island. The Hon. W. O. Stanley has communicated 
to the Royal Archzological Institute some interesting notes on this subject. 
It is hardly to be doubted that copper was exported from Anglesey prior to 
the landing of the Romans, and, indeed, the mineral wealth of Mona may 
have attracted the Romans thither. About the year 1640 a cake, or massa, of 
smelted copper was discovered, bearing the inscription ‘‘ Socio Rome.” It is 
said to have been found at Caerhén, the ancient Conovium. In 1840 a second 
cake was discovered in Llangwyllog, and in 1869 three cakes were found at 
Castellor. Two years later three cakes were dug up at Bryndon, Amlwch, 
and passed into the hands of Mr. T. F. Evans, who has described them in a 
recent number of “Iron.” One of the cakes is remarkable for being stamped, 
on two hunches, with the letters IV L S. They are curious relics, which may 
