14)6 Mr. John Taylor's Prospectus 



instruclion and comparison; but to many, who have not these 

 advantages, the door of improvement yet remains in a manner 

 closed : they hear indistinctly of the progress of others, but, 

 not having the means of judging rightly, they are too apt 

 to fence themselves in with prejudice and conceit, and to resist 

 what has not originated with themselves. Nothing, in my mind, 

 could do so much towards the removal of such narrow views, 

 as a School of Mining, where young men, while they could 

 continue their practice underground, might hear those sciences 

 explained which would be most useful to them, and might de- 

 vote some of the spare hours which a miner's life affords, to 

 seeing and comparing the practice of others in a place where 

 their art has reached the greatest perfection. 



With regard to tlie capacity of the working class of miners 

 for instruction, but little requires to be said : it is, I conceive, 

 admitted by those who know them best, that they possess it 

 in a peculiar degree. From this class the agents even of the 

 largest mines are taken ; and if I were to say much of what I 

 think of the talents that they commonly possess, and of the 

 excellent use they make of the means of instruction, slight as 

 they are, which are thrown in their way, it might appear that 

 I meant to flatter men with whom I am much associated and 

 to whom I am so mucli indebted ; — but the fact is notorious, in 

 Cornwall particularly, that education is much sought after 

 among the miners, and that its benefits are improved as much 

 as the means will admit, and even frequently far beyond what 

 could be expected from the few opportunities at present af- 

 forded them. Miners in general are a superior class of men, 

 and, in the deep mines particularly, the constant exercise of 

 judgement and thought which is necessary, produces a propor- 

 tionate deijree of intelligence. 



T 1 



In the army a great effect has been produced by the course 

 of instruction provided of late years for the corps of Sappers 

 and Miners; and under judicious arrangement even the privates 

 have been taught so much of the science of their duties, as to 

 have produced numerous instances of men well qualified to di- 

 rect, without having rendered them less disposed to obey. 

 Surely then it is highly probable that a similar effect might be 

 produced upon men whose duties are not unlike, and are 

 even more varied and difficult. 



The demand for intelligent and well-instructed miners is 

 now greater than at any former period ; our deep mines are 

 most extensively worked, from the increased call for the me- 

 tals they produce, and the facility with which capital is ob- 

 tained for such undertakings; the shallow mines are daily 

 approaching to the state when more skill is required, and when 



machinery 



I 



