the Ancraui Iron- Woiks in Columbia Couiiti/, New- York. 1 1 7 



the charge, where the temperature of the furnace is consi- 

 derably lowered by the successive additions of cold ore, char- 

 coal, &c. 



This substance is not, it is true, found at present forming 

 in the Ancram furnace ; but this may in a great measure be 

 owing to a better roasting of the ore, previous to its introduc- 

 tion into the furnace. It may also be occasioned by the cir- 

 cumstance that all the ore destined for Ancram is picked with 

 great care at the ore bed. I must not, however, omit to state, 

 that I found in the flue erected above the orifice of the furnace, 

 for the protection of the workmen, a red, pulverulent sub- 

 stance, to M'hich the workmen have given the name of sulphur, 

 a name which, as the editor of the Emporium has well ob- 

 served, has been most unfortunately given by furnace and forge 

 men, to every product which puzzles them, and without any 

 regard to its real comjiosition : this powder I supposed to be 

 a mixture of ashes and fine ore, blown out of the furnace by 

 the rapid current of air ; I conceived that if there was any 

 zinc with the ore, it would be likely to be detected in this sub- 

 stance; accordingly I found by analysis, about eight per cent, 

 ot oxide of zinc, a quantity much greater than I expected. It 

 would require a more accurate study of the progress of the 

 furnace than I could make in two days, and a better know- 

 ledge of the methods formerly in use, to determine why cad- 

 mia are not formed there at present, as they were formerly. 

 Dr. Torrey has, I believe, never visited Ancram, and the in- 

 formation which he received on the subject may have led him 

 into error. For instance, he was misinformed (I think) when 

 he stated, that " it was found when taking down one of the 

 old walls of the furnace erected in the year 1744." We were 

 lol(l by Mr. Patterson, that it had never been found but in 

 taking down a wall connected with the furnace, and which 

 iiaving been built after the furnace, may have contained mate- 

 rials which had been extracted from it at different times. This 

 observation is of more importance than it at first appears; for 

 if, as Mr. Patterson told us, the Ancram furnace was the first 

 erected in the colonies of North America, or at least the first 

 in the jirovince of New- York, and it; according to Dr. Torrey, 

 the cadmia had been Ibimd in the wall of the first fin-nace 

 erected, the substance must have pre-existed to any finiiace 

 known to have been erected there, which we think is not the 

 case. 



But, in addition to all the above-mentioned proofs, and to 

 those which might be drawn from the circumstance of its being 

 found in lliu vicinity of a furnace, I have been able to obtahi 

 the evidence of men to the fact of its liaving been formed in it. 



Having 



