136 = Electro-magnetic properties in the mines of Cornwall. 
_ If this projected improvement should prove successful, it would af- 
ford an additional and most important market for the coal of the an- 
thracite mines, which perhaps, from its great abundance, and the in- 
creasing facilities of conveyance, may soon. sink too low in price to 
enable the proprietors to prosecute their mining operations with fair 
advantage ; nor is this all; it would afford also a new market for 
spirit, the cheaper kinds of which would then be used for fuel ; they 
would be appropriated to the furnace instead of the firemen, and 
thus the great cause of temperance would be promoted by dimin- 
ishing the temptation to drink, and an adequate substitute would be 
afforded for the consumption. Should there be found to be any ad- 
vantage in mingling steam with the vapor of the inflammable fluids, it 
could be easily introduced by a very simple and obvious contrivance. 
This proposed improvement appears therefore to be a fair and rea- 
sonable subject of experiment for the proprietors of steam-boats} 
and we are the more persuaded that it will be tried, as many of these 
gentlemen do not regard exclusively the profits of their capital, but 
view, with a benevolent and patriotic feeling, the great cause of 
public improvement and of national prosperity.* 
Yale College, March 16, 1831. 
Art. XVII—On the electro-magnetic properties of metalliferous 
veins in the mines of Cornwall; by Rosert Were Fox of 
F'almouth.—Communicated by Prof. J. Griscom, 
Havine received from my friend R. W. Fox of Falmouth, a copy 
of his interesting paper on the electro-magnetic properties of metal- 
liferous veins, read before the Royal Society on the 10th of June, 
1830, I have no doubt that the following abstract of it will be highly 
acceptable to the readers of the American Journal. The subject 8 
new, and the author in his letter accompanying the paper, intimates 
the wish that analogous investigations might be prosecuted | in this 
country. He expresses a desire in particular, to receive information 
relative to the prevalent horizontal direction and underlie of some of 
’ the principal metallic veins in the United States—the nature of their 
vein stones, and whether they accord with the rocks traversed ; also, 
whether the metallic veins are intersected and shifted by other veins 
of quartz, clay, or other substances, as in giles In addiaon to 
observe with stoi that coal with suppose the bituminous # Nova ra Sco 
sj has been recently introduced into the Rhode Island steam boats, with much 
economy of room, money and trouble. 
